With the support of the Mediawan audiovisual group he co-founded, the dynamic businessman has purchased land and buildings at a former air base near Reims with the aim of turning it into a major film location.
Champagne! A European “Hollywood” wants to set up shop near Reims…
Behind this ambitious project is businessman and billionaire Xavier Niel.
He plans to transform nearly 50 hectares acquired on July 22 on a former air base in Champagne into a “center of excellence for European cinema.”
The future “Studios de Reims”—as they will be called—will be dedicated to the production of films, series, documentaries, and other digital content. They could be operational in the medium term, with the first sets expected to be delivered by the end of 2026. However, they will not be completely finalized before 2031.
The project is expected to create 250 to 300 local jobs.
Xavier Niel could well succeed once again. In his private life, the husband of Delphine Arnault always seems to be one step ahead.
Serial entrepreneur
Already a millionaire at the age of 24 thanks to… Minitel rose (a pornographic service company via the famous little box that was a huge hit in France before the arrival of the Internet), he is now best known for his activities in telecommunications as the founder of Free and Iliad (owner of numerous operators). But he has also invested in the media (notably as co-owner of Le Monde), in the hotel and leisure industry (the Lys-Chantilly golf course, the 5-star hotels L’Apogée Courchevel and Cheval Blanc St-Barth Isle de France, etc.), the US Créteil football club, and Kyuta, a research laboratory that aims to become the European leader in open source artificial intelligence.
In 2010, he co-founded the Kima Ventures fund, which invests in start-ups, and in 2017 he launched Station F in Paris, the world’s largest incubator for start-ups. He is also behind the 42 school, which opened in 2013 and offers free training in programming and digital technical professions, open to all without the need for qualifications.
Center of excellence for French cinema
But this (non-exhaustive) list also includes the co-founding, in 2015, with Mathieu Pigasse and Pierre-Antoine Capton, of the French audiovisual group Mediawan.
The group has established itself as a major international player in the sector, producing successful films and series such as Bac Nord, Le Comte de Monte-Cristo, L’Amour ouf, Dix pour cent and HPI.
L’Hebdo du vendredi is keen to highlight the “strategic logistical location” of the chosen site, “close to Reims and less than an hour from Paris by TGV,” which “could attract French and foreign productions looking for new filming locations outside the Île-de-France region.”
“It will be simpler and more fluid in terms of logistics, at competitive prices compared to the saturated market in Paris,” promised a spokesperson for Xavier Niel in an interview with the regional daily L’Union.
Former air base
Since the closure in 2011 of the former 112 air base near Reims, the disused runways and some of the buildings had already been partially taken over by a sustainable agriculture research project run by the Terrasolis association. It is expected to continue its activities after the opening of the Reims Studios.
But the audiovisual industry had also taken its first steps in recent years in three former hangars on the site, which had been converted into technical studios for television productions, particularly series and advertising campaigns. These will be the starting point for the first phase of the future Studios de Reims.
To make the €72 million investment requested by the latter, €12 million of which will be covered by the public authorities, multi-entrepreneur Xavier Niel is not acting alone. He has created an ad hoc structure supported by the Mediawan group.
Decentralizing audiovisual activity
The government’s support for the future Reims Studios is an illustration of its desire to decentralize audiovisual activity, which is currently concentrated in the Paris region. Tax incentives, such as the film tax credit, encourage filming outside the capital.
Today, the main audiovisual production studios are located mainly in the Paris region. The oldest have been modernized, such as the Studios d’Épinay-sur-Seine (Seine-Saint-Denis), created in 1907, the Studios de Boulogne (Hauts-de-Seine), inaugurated in 1941, and the Studios de Bry-sur-Marne (Val-de-Marne), built in the late 1970s and now used for numerous films and series.
More recently, director Luc Besson (The Big Blue, Léon, The Fifth Element, Subway, etc.) was the initiator of La Cité du Cinéma, which opened in Saint-Denis in 2012. With the ambition of becoming “the French Cinecittà,” this modern studio complex hosts both national and international film shoots.
Studios in the provinces
But a handful of studios have also flourished outside the Paris region. And not necessarily to shoot “B movies”… The iconic Studios de la Victorine, founded in 1919 by Louis Nalpas and Serge Sandberg with the ambition of making Nice, where they are located, the European capital of cinema (already…), have recently been renovated. Among the cult films that were made there are Le Bossu, Le Corniaud, Les Enfants du Paradis, Fanfan la Tulipe, Le Gendarme à Saint Tropez and La Main au Collet, to name but a few.
Much more recent (it opened in 2015, the Provence Studios complex, located in Martigues, near Marseille, a wide variety of audiovisual projects, a growing proportion of which comes from international productions such as The Nun 2 (Warner Bros) and other commercials, while the Transpasets Studios, inaugurated in 2012 in Saint-Yriex-sur-Charente (Charente), target local and national film, commercial, and music video productions.
Will Les Studios de Reims manage to carve out a place for themselves among their more or less legendary predecessors? In any case, it is more than likely that Xavier Niel and his associates will give it their all…
Read also: Xavier Niel takes to the stage at the Olympia with a humorous account of his career
Featured photo: © Creative Commons
