Lionsgate is putting down stakes in metropolitan New York City.
The Hollywood studio is set to become the anchor tenant in a $100 million studio complex in Yonkers, 20 minutes from Manhattan. Great Point Capital Management — a media-focused investment fund run by Robert Halmi, president and CEO of Hallmark Entertainment, and Fehmi Zeko — is building the production facility.
Lionsgate will be a minority investor and have naming rights to the studio. Construction on the Yonkers site will start in November, and the facility is set to open in late autumn 2020.
The studio complex will have three 20,000-square-foot and two 10,000-square-foot soundstages, a fully operational backlot and space to create a location-based entertainment property similar to what Lionsgate has already in China and the Middle East.
The studio complex on the Hudson River is situated next to the new Yonkers train station. National Resources, another investment partner on the Yonkers studio, will oversee construction.
“It’s rare to find a studio facility in such a prime New York metropolitan area location, and we look forward to being at the center of film and television production growth in the region,” Lionsgate CEO Jon Feltheimer said in a statement.
Halmi and Jim Reeve also run Great Point Media, which develops, finances, distributes and sells IP in entertainment media. The U.K.-based company has movie credits like Damsel, Love After Love, The Party and Lady Macbeth.