City a new Hollywood North?

By Lethbridge Herald on September 19, 2025.

Alejandra Pulido-Guzman
Lethbridge Herald

The City of Lethbridge has partnered with Economic Development Lethbridge to launch Screen Lethbridge, a new initiative that aims to make the filming process clear, accessible and filmmaker friendly in order to attract production companies to the city. 

Screen Lethbridge supports everything from large-scale productions to grassroots filmmaking. It encourages short films, features films, episodic television and more. As Lethbridge’s arts scene continues to grow, this initiative adds a powerful new chapter to its creative story.

Ismail Okasha, Film Services Support with the City of Lethbridge, says the initiative was created to not only attract film makers to the city, but also to push the film industry within the city as it has been growing through the industry in Alberta. 

“We’ve had big productions from The Last of Us and Ghostbusters, and this is giving us the opportunity to insert our name in the conversation so we can showcase our beautiful culture, our landscapes, our people and we can drive growth in the economy as well in the city,” says Okasha. 

Screen Lethbridge is basically doing some of the legwork and developing a process that makes things easier for productions to film within the city. 

“We’ve been scouting locations, all through the city whether at city property or private property, and we’ve been placing them on the locations database in Lethbridge,” says Okasha. 

He’s also been working on a program to make the film-making process as seamless as possible when it comes to permits and request for property filming in the city. 

“We want to make it as easy as possible for location managers and producers to come in and just book the property, make it seamless as possible,” says Okasha. 

Nick Bohle, CEO and Founder of Lethbridge-based HatChap Productions says the initiative is definitely something that an initiative like this gives filmmakers who live here and those who center their work here, an opportunity to be a part of a larger conversation and of professional productions.

“It leads to accreditation, workshops, infrastructure development, and it makes it more attractive to come to a place that has an actual policy that’s geared towards professional filmmaking,” says Bohle. 

He explains that before they had to get a “special event” permit whenever filming something within the city, but the paperwork was not geared towards filming specifically, making the process tedious and for the most part irrelevant which caused time delays sifting through unrelated questions like what kind of vendor they were, or the type of merchandise they were selling. 

“But now there’s an actual permitting process specifically for film. Film makers have a little bit more clarity on what they’re allowed to do, what they’re not allowed to do, how long they can be there and all of that kind of stuff,” says Bohle. 

And in terms of the economic impact that attracting film makers to the city, Trevor Lewington, CEO of Economic Development Lethbridge says the impact is very broad and to make it so, the choice of calling the initiative Screen Lethbridge was very intentional. 

“When you think about creative industries or anything that will go on a screen, between gaming, interactive digital media, film and TV, it’s a multibillion-dollar industry in Alberta,” said Lewington. 

He explains that the city of Edmonton, for example where about one third of the industry is located, suggests it’s responsible for up to 50,000 jobs. 

“Part of this initiative was really to make sure that Lethbridge is getting its fair share of that provincial pie and it’s a billion-dollar opportunity, so we wanted to make sure we were there to play,” says Lewington. 

He adds that since “The Last of Us” clearly put Alberta on the map, and within it Lethbridge by showcasing the High Level bridge and the river valley, and that production was a blockbuster worth half a billion dollars, it demonstrated to the industry that all the things needed for a production, from a technical perspective, to sound engineering, and construction for backdrops, can be found in other places and for a more affordable price. 

“Alberta has all of the scenery, but it’s also much cheaper place to do those kinds of productions. And credit to the provincial government, they have a tax incentive program that Lethbridge can tap into,” said Lewington. 

There is an additional incentive outside of Edmonton and Calgary that Lethbridge can take advantage of as the government promotes rural areas.  

“Those tax incentives combined with low cost and all the available talent just makes it a no brainer for production firms to look outside the traditional centres even outside the Vancouvers and Torontos of the world,” said Lewington. 

He adds that Lethbridge also has the advantage of affordability compared with bigger centres like Calgary and Edmonton, while offering either a big city or small city atmosphere for filming. 

More information on the Screen Lethbridge initiative can be found at screenlethbridge.com.