Tax incentives bring renewed production interest to mighty Manitoba

The Canadian province of Manitoba is enjoying a post-strike production uptick, with some US studios shooting in Winnipeg for the first time, as its generous tax credit programmes attract growing international attention in a budget-squeezed environment.

Manitoba has long been a popular filming destination for both Canadian and international productions, with a robust tax credit and skilled crew base combining with locations that can double for smalltown America or larger cities like Chicago and New York.

But as budget-constrained times lead to a reconfiguration of the global production map, the province is seeing growing interest as domestic and international platforms zero in on spending efficiencies. At a time when the business model has arguably never been more important for film and TV productions, Manitoba offers one of the most competitive tax credits in North America.

The Manitoba Film & Video Production Tax Credit, which is administered by Manitoba Film & Music (MFM) provides two main programmes, the Cost-of-Salaries Tax Credit and the Cost-of-Production Tax Credit. Productions can apply for one or the other, not both.

The cost-of-salaries credit enables eligible productions to receive up to 65% back on eligible Manitoba labour. That starts with a base rate of 45%, calculated on eligible Manitoba labour expenditures, which can then be stacked with 5% bonus for coproducing with a local production company, a 10% frequent filming bonus (for shooting three projects within a two-year period) and a further 5% bonus for shooting outside of Winnipeg. These can additionally be stacked with the federal Canadian Film or Video Production Services Tax Credit (PSTC).

With the cost-of-production tax credit, projects can receive up to 38% on eligible Manitoba spend. This credit consists of a base rate of 30%, calculated on eligible Manitoba expenditures, which increases by 8% if a production partners with a local prodco. This tax credit can also be used in conjunction with the PSTC.

Full details about the cost-of-salaries credit can be found here, and click here for further info on the cost-of-production tax credit.

One of the other attractive elements of the Manitoba tax credit programme is that it has no per-project cap, Lynne Skromeda, CEO and film commissioner at MFM, tells C21. “We have a particular advantage here with our incentives in the sense that there is no cap – there’s no minimum, no maximum – and we don’t have content requirements either, so that provides a much easier entry point for people to come and utilise our tax credit,” she says.

“So we can have smaller budget projects, larger budget projects and everything inbetween, and we have a variety of crews who can service that.”

In addition to hosting a high volume of Canadian series and features – including Crave series Little Bird, Acting Good and Don’t Even and CBC/Paramount+ airborne medical procedural SkyMed – Manitoba has also in recent years seen an uptick in the number of American productions heading north.

The sequel to Bob Odenkirk-led action-thriller Nobody (from Universal Pictures) shot in Winnipeg last summer, while the US actor who played defining roles in Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul filmed a second movie, the Ben Wheatley-directed independent crime thriller Normal, in the city in the latter part of 2024.

Another Universal Pictures movie, action-comedy Love Hurts, starring Ke Huy Quan, Ariana DeBose and Daniel Wu, filmed in Manitoba last year and hit theatres in February. Furthermore, Lionsgate filmed its dystopian horror film The Long Walk, based on Stephen King’s novel of the same name, in Winnipeg in 2024, while 20th Century Studios brought its Vince Vaughn and James Marsden-led buddy comedy Mike & Nick & Nick & Alice to the province.

And 30 minutes before chatting with C21, Skromeda received a call confirming that another major series had been confirmed to shoot in Winnipeg this summer.

“For the longest time we were just Hallmark and horror films, but we’ve really been showing in the past few years that we are capable of far more than that,” she says. “And in the past year we’ve seen more people come up here – we’ve had a couple of studios come up for the first time – and have a good experience.”

She adds: “Word is traveling that the people are great, the locations are good and [the studios] were able to get the kind of quality they needed out of the production community. We’ve not necessarily been on everyone’s radar screen, but we are now well and truly being seen as a real player in the game.”

While many of the international productions that shoot in Winnipeg are features, the province is looking to bring more TV and streaming shows to the province. The robust studio infrastructure, in addition to direct flights to and from LA, make Manitoba a highly competitive jurisdiction in which to produce series, says Skromeda, particularly when combined with all the province’s other advantages.

In addition to its tax credit programmes, Manitoba also has a relatively low cost of living when compared to other major Canadian production hubs such as Vancouver, Toronto and Montreal. And across the board, Canada is becoming an increasingly enticing proposition from a financial perspective, due to the fact the Canadian dollar has been low for some time. Today, C$1 equals 69 American cents, 64 Euro cents and 53 British pence.

“When you add all these things together, the whole is greater than the sum of the parts and there is a way to make [money] go further here,” says Skromeda.

In terms of unscripted, the province has become a popular destination for blue-chip wildlife documentaries due to its northern community Churchill, which has become known as a prime location to observe polar bears.

Skromeda says that, increasingly, the province is seeing more filming take place outside of spring and summer, which are typically its busiest periods. One particularly popular location is a lake in the central part of the province that freezes over in the winter. That lake has meant Manitoba can double for Antarctica, and MFM is having conversations with productions now looking to shoot there next winter.

While the financial advantages are many in Manitoba, Skromeda emphasises that it is the quality of the crew base, locations and local production community that are the bedrock of its continued rise as a filming destination.

“It’s a case of come for the incentives, stay for the experience. Because everyone is looking at the financial aspect, that’s often what gets people in the door – but you must have the right partners on your project, the right locations and the right infrastructure to make it all happen,” she says. “It’s important that people understand we’re not just about the budget, but we have all these other elements that create a good qualitative experience here.”