Industry celebrates 20 years of Kent Film Office

The film industry in Kent has been celebrating the anniversary of an organisation promoting the county as a production destination.

Kent Film Office was started 20 years ago to attract film and television productions to the county and support them during shooting.

Gabrielle Lindemann, who has managed the organisation throughout that time, told BBC Radio Kent it had "been a real pleasure because Kent is so diverse that we get a lot of different kinds of films".

Productions including Call the Midwife, Bridgerton and Empire of Light are among dozens of productions part-filmed in Kent in recent years, according to the office.

The organisation, which is part of Kent County Council, claims to have generated £85m of investment for the county since it was founded, as well as creating jobs and attracting tourists.

It said production teams for 186 films, 169 TV drams and 231 music videos filmed in the county in the last two decades.

Jane Milton, a film lecturer at Canterbury Christchurch University, said her department had a "good and strong relationship with the Kent Film Office".

"It plays a crucial role in bringing new talent, and talent from Kent, and giving them the opportunity to step into the industry," she told BBC Radio Kent.

She said her students could send in their CVs and be put forward to visiting productions for jobs as runners on sets to "get their first step on the ladder in what is a very competitive career".

Chloe Wilson, commercial sales manager at the Historic Dockyard Chatham, said the office had offered "fantastic support for our location", which had opened the site up to new visitors due to popular programmes like Call the Midwife filming there.

Lindemann said Kent was an attractive place to film because "we have some incredible locations, landscapes, and we're close to London as well".

"Film companies don't want to come and just shoot something for 10 minutes, so if we can offer them a lot of diverse locations and opportunities then they're much more likely to come and film," she added.

Josephine Clark, the commercial director of Maidstone Studios, said the county's homegrown talent was also an attraction.

"There is such a wealth of creative people in Kent," she said. "It's surprising how many people are actually based here, and you don't always need a crew that comes out of London."

Follow BBC Kent on Facebook, on X, and on Instagram. Send your story ideas to southeasttoday@bbc.co.uk or WhatsApp us on 08081 002250.