Texas' abortion law banning the procedure after six or so weeks of pregnancy "has officially made its impact on the local film scene," with The Wire creator David Simon announcing he won't film an upcoming HBO project in the state, the Houston Chronicle reports. The Baltimore-based TV writer tweeted Monday that he's "turning in scripts next month on an HBO non-fiction miniseries based on events in Texas, but I can't and won't ask female cast/crew to forgo civil liberties to film there." He added he was searching for a shoot location that could be taken for Dallas-Fort Worth.
"We stage production where women risk nothing and endure nothing to control their own bodies. Those places exist with adequate facilities to film," Simon went on. He got a lot of pushback, including from the Dallas Film Commission, which replied that "not bringing a production to Dallas (a big "D") only serves to further disenfranchise those that live here. We need talent/crew/creatives to stay & vote, not get driven out by inability to make a living," per Deadline. Simon wasn't deterred, however. "My singular responsibility is to securing and maintaining the civil liberties of all those we employ," he responded.
He went on to hit out at Texas' "square-headed, all-hat-no-cattle s---posters trying to use hack politicians to crawl into every last womb they can" and, in response to one user who claimed the law protected life, added that "life, innocent or no, is not viable at far longer than six weeks." More than 100 actors have also spoken out against the Texas law, per Deadline, with some vowing to boycott the state. Filmmakers added more than $1.6 billion to Texas' economy from 2007 to 2020, per the Hill. (Production companies refused to film in Georgia after it passed a similar law in 2019.)
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