The acclaimed Hollywood director behind the new Netflix movie 'The School for Good and Evil', which was filmed in Northern Ireland, said he was "thrilled to be back" on a visit to Belfast.
Paul Feig, the man behind major blockbusters such as Bridesmaids and the Ghostbusters remake, made NI his home back in 2021 while the film was in production.
Speaking to Belfast Live, he shared that his wife is ready to swap Hollywood USA for Holywood, Co Down, after falling in love with Belfast and beyond.
Watch: Trailer released for Netflix fantasy movie filmed in Northern Ireland
Paul said: "I am thrilled to be back - so happy to see my crew and all my actors who live here. When we were here, it was mostly during the lockdown so I didn't get to experience the full city until the last couple of weeks so it's nice to be back and coming in when everything's open.
"It was nice to see the town alive again."
The School For Good and Evil is based on a best-selling series of young adult fantasy novels by Soman Chainani and follows a group of girls and boys who are taken to an institution and trained to become fairytale-like heroes and villains. With huge stars like Charlize Theron and Kerry Washington taking leading roles, it is one of the biggest productions to film in Northern Ireland.
Paul, who is known for his comedy directing with many episodes of the US Office under his belt, stepped into a different direction with the world of fantasy for 'The School for Good and Evil' which he called a "fun but difficult process".
"Bringing it to life was a really fun challenge because this is the first time I have been able to build a work from the ground up. Normally, you are shooting something in our world but we invented every world we’re in.
"It was really really fun and exciting to see it all come together.
"As much as I was intimidated at first, I immediately just embraced it because one of the first reasons I like to do these bigger movies…is you get to work with all these great designers and artists and special effects people. It was almost important for me to ensure we did as much as we could practically on set because I didn’t want just a bunch of special effects and a bunch of green screens," he explained.
Coming over to film the movie was the first time Paul had ever been to Northern Ireland - but it certainly will not be the last.
He continued: "I had always wanted to come and I have friends who are from here - I love going somewhere and just being able to live there and be here for about six months like we were. It felt like I settled in and got to know every place and whenever we were off, just walk all over the city.
"The people are just so lovely so I would shoot here again in a heartbeat."
Remarking on working with the thriving screen industry here, Paul said it was “really wonderful” being able to work with a new host of faces behind the scenes.
"We had the greatest background actors - they were all so wonderful. It is very gruelling to be a background artist in a movie with insane costumes we put them in and massive hair.
"At the weekends, I would go to M&S and see one of our background artists there working so it was really fun and it felt like a whole community coming together. I couldn’t have had a better time."
Paul continued: “I really loved Big Dog Forest [Fermanagh] that we shot in. It wasn’t easy to shoot in because of the rain and at one point, we were going through very deep mud to do it but it was just so gorgeous.
"Some people in my crew were trying to talk me out of doing it because they thought it was going to be really hard to get up there but it looked like nothing I’d ever seen. I think it looks so nice that people will watch the movie and think it’s a special effect."
A lot of the film was shot in sound stages at Belfast Harbour Studios and other locations such as Mount Stewart and the Ulster Folk Museum.
On the possibility of returning to Northern Ireland in the future to utilise the booming film industry, Paul hinted that he would love to come back with another production.
He said: "It’s hard to find big stages and these days, there is so much stuff in production, not only because of movie studios but because of all the streaming studios so we are constantly fighting for stage space all over the world.
"I will bang the drum to tell people to come and shoot in Belfast - I would totally come back here again.
"My wife is obsessed now, she wants to rent a house in Holywood next time so it couldn’t be better."
The School for Good and Evil will be released on Netflix on October 19.
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