'Twisters' brings in millions of dollars to Oklahoma

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — "Twisters'" has been dubbed the blockbuster movie of the summer. It's been doing well at the box office, but also in making a big economic impact on the state and the filming locations.

There were a lot of filming locations for the movie including Park Avenue in Oklahoma City, Chickasha, El Reno, Howe, Midwest City and Spencer.

"Oklahoma is an emerging state in this industry, but we're willing to roll up our sleeves and do what needs to be done to bring this new economic impact to our state," said Hagan Hunter, the Executive VP of Studio Operations for Prairie Surf.

The Oklahoma City Film and Creative Industries Office said direct spending in the city was $42.6 million.

The office said once they use their model to measure the potential performance of the movie, it's much higher going back to the city.

"The impact of that one film was $258 million," said Jill Simpson, the Executive Director of the Oklahoma City Film and Creative Industries Office.

Simpson said that's an avenue to create quality jobs for the next generation who want to pursue tech and creative careers.

The movie centers around Oklahoma, but production used a lot of local businesses on set.

"You look at the people that run their dry cleaning shops, the steel yards, the lumber yard, the glass manufacturers," said Hunter.

One of those businesses feeling the positive impact is Metal Supermarkets.

"If you see some steel flying around, that probably came from us," said Jason Price, the Franchise Owner of Metal Supermarkets.

Price said they sold over 100,000 pounds of metal to the movie.

"Some of the speed rails, the cars, the props with the with the vehicles. Also, I was told that the train scene—a lot of the metal that we provided, you know, allowed them to put that train together," said Price.

A town with prominent exposure in the movie is El Reno and the city manager said people have already been traveling into town taking photos of filming locations in the movie.

"We're seeing a little bit of uptick in interest in El Reno. We hope this leads to additional tourism and visitors from statewide," said Matt Sandidge, the El Reno City Manager.

Prairie Surf also played a major part in the movie to help with some of the filming locations.

Hagan said some of the sets were filmed at their studios.

"It's pushing the limits of what people think can be done in Oklahoma. As far as film, it's putting us on the same level as the L.A.'s, as the Atlanta's," said Hagan.

He also believes it's huge for Oklahoma and said there were 28,000 hotel nights spend in Oklahoma City during production.

"Any time you have a chance to bring such an iconic story back like Twisters, which is a reimagining of the original Twister ..1996, it's not only an honor, but it's a win. It's a win for for not just us, but the city," said Hagan.

“We honored to have worked with Universal Pictures in hosting the production of ‘Twisters’ in Oklahoma,” said Oklahoma Film + Music Office Director Jeanette Stanton. “Productions like this not only bring significant economic impact to the state, but ‘Twisters’ in particular really helped showcase the State of Oklahoma as a valuable character within the story both on-screen and behind the scenes, highlighting our local workforce, businesses, communities, weather technologies and even a number of Oklahoma musicians featured on the soundtrack.”

The Oklahoma City Film and Creative Industries Office also said in addition to the jobs the movie brought for hundreds of Oklahomans, eight people from underserved communities were able to get job training and internships during the movie as part of NBC Universal's workforce training program.

For more on how Twisters made an impact in the state, check out Prairie Surf's social account.