Photographs Courtesy of CMT
Kevin Fonteyne as Johnny Cash, Drake Milligan as Elvis Presley, and Christian Lees as Jerry Lee Lewis
Producers of “Sun Records” are pitching the show to Amazon and the CW network after CMT decided not to pick up a second season of the Memphis-set, Memphis-shot show.
Linn Sitler, commissioner of the Memphis Film and Television Commission, told Memphis City Council members Tuesday that Kevin Kane, president of the Memphis Convention and Visitors Bureau, paid the rent on the show’s soundstage here for one month to allow producers to pitch the show to the other networks.
CMT already paid for scripts and outlines for season two of the show, Sitler said. So, they are “ready to go” for a second season. She said she has her “fingers crossed” for the meetings with the other networks, though she said “it may be a long shot.”
About $9 million is already set aside in the state budget for season two and season three of “Sun Records.” However, if the show is not renewed, that money all goes back to Nashville in a pot set aside for other film and television projects across the state.
“We do have other projects, one of them is rather big” Sitler said, without divulging details. “If it happens, we’ll jump to take advantage of that (state) money.”
The “Sun Records” production here left over $6 million in the Memphis economy, Sitler said. The only other project that brought more money to the area was the 1996 movie, “The People Vs. Larry Flynt.”
All of the news came during the Commission’s budget hearing at Memphis City Hall Tuesday. The Commission asked council members for $175,000, the same amount the organization got from the city last year. The council’s budget committee approved the request.
The Commission is funded by both the city and the county.
