JJ Abrams Shooting GHOST WRITER in Providence
Posted: Thu Aug 14, 2025 6:24 pm
Abrams and Shymalan both in town, shooting their new movies at the same time?!? Crazy.
Shyamalan's film has been shooting all over RI this summer -- sounds like this is just a 7-day stint.
Shyamalan's film has been shooting all over RI this summer -- sounds like this is just a 7-day stint.
https://www.providencejournal.com/story ... 191065007/Filming for J.J. Abrams's "Ghostwriter" is set to begin in Providence, Rhode Island on August 18th.
The movie, starring Glen Powell, Jenna Ortega, and Samuel L. Jackson, is a retro sci-fi mystery set in the 1980s.
While "Ghostwriter" began filming in the UK, specific Providence filming locations, aside from Benefit Street and Wickenden, remain undisclosed.
The reason for filming in Providence, a city with ties to sci-fi authors Edgar Allan Poe and H.P. Lovecraft, is speculated to be related to the film's themes.
PROVIDENCE − Crews on Thursday, Aug. 14, prepared sets for a J.J. Abrams movie that is expected to begin filming in Providence on Monday.
A press release from the state Film & Television Office on Thursday did not identify the "Star Wars" director as making the film in Providence this month. It only identified it as being from Warner Brothers Pictures. But crew members preparing a set at the corner of Wickenden Street and Hope Street said Abrams is the director.
Abrams, who brought audiences two of the "Star Wars" movies, two of the "Star Trek" films, "Mission Impossible III," "Super 8" and the TV series "Lost," has been working this summer in the United Kingdom on a science-fiction blockbuster tentatively called "Ghostwriter," with an all-star cast including Glen Powell, Jenna Ortega and Samuel L. Jackson.
Filming notices recently posted in the area of Benefit Street and Angell Street said filming will begin Monday, Aug. 18, which was confirmed by the crew on Wickenden Street. Crew members filming M. Night Shyamalan's "Remain" at the beginning of August said this latest movie shoot is expected to last about a week.
On Thursday, the police had posted "No Parking" signs along streets near the intersection of Wickenden and Hope. The city has not yet disclosed what other streets might be closed or have restricted parking.
Filming for "Ghostwriter" began April 25 at Warner Bros. Studios Leavesden, a 200-acre studio complex and former World War II aircraft factory and airfield outside London. Production moved in June to Scotland, on location in Edinburgh and Glasgow, where streets were decorated to look like a futuristic New York City, according to reports in the Scottish press.
Although Warner Bros. has not released a synopsis of the movie, Scottish press reported that "Ghostwriter" is a retro science-fiction, mystery and fantasy story set in the 1980s about an author who finds that the mythical world he imagined is real.
While the two Scottish cities were transformed to play a futuristic locale, it's unclear whether Rhode Island will portray modern times or some different period.
Are we EVER going to let go of that decade?! Even as a Gen-X'er, it's beyond tired by now.
Nostalgia waves used to run on an approximately 20-year cycle...in the 1970s we were obsessed with the 50s, the 60s in the 80s, the 70s in the 90s, etc. But since the 80s cycle started in the 2000s, we got stuck on it. Yes, there's been an increase in 90s and even -- God help us -- early 2000s nostalgia over the last decade, but movies and TV shows keep on trotting out the mullets, popped collars and gleaming chromium logos, and it's all gotten rather trite and repetitive. I think that Stranger Things becoming such a success story in 2016 gave the 80s cycle an unexpected second wind, and we've been seeing the fallout from that ever since. I'll admit I'm a sucker for gratuitous nostalgia, but can't we have something...new, for a change?