Real estate: “The dream car lobby on the screen is stronger in France than the construction one”

VSIt is a monument of French cinema in its own way. From Roman Polanski to Guillaume Canet, Dan Marie Antoinette that Hunger gamesThe Bry-sur-Marne (Val-de-Marne) studios have hosted a good portion of France’s filming for thirty years in its 5,600 square meter studios and large spaces. But of course, twelve hectares of land fifteen kilometers from Paris and close to the future Grand Paris metro station, it attracts greed. Especially at a time when ministers, professionals and associations cry about the lack of housing construction, especially in Ile-de-France, which also leads to a “social bomb”. Nexity, the owner of the buildings built by the former French production company, thought it could handle the mixed project of building and maintaining audiovisual activities.

The promoter eventually chose to take the plunge and sold the unique space to insurer Axa, which promises to double the site’s production capacity to make it one of the biggest studios in continental Europe. It will compete with the Cité du Cinéma of Saint-Denis and its 9,500 square meters of space. The on-screen dream car lobby is stronger in France than the real estate lobby.

It must be said that for an investor, this niche of production studios is very prosperous at the moment of the streaming boom. Thus, the Netflix platform invests billions of euros in the production of local series around the world. In France, he receives 200 million euros annually for creating more than twenty original works. Netflix has already set up a giant studio near Madrid, Spain.

Prosperity Island was threatened

It is therefore not surprising that real estate investors such as Blackstone or Axa rush to this island of prosperity at a time when commercial real estate is plunged into crisis. It’s only just begun, according to real estate expert Knight Frank’s global research. He claims that half of the large multinationals he surveyed plan to reduce office space by 10% to 20% within three years. Telecommuting is again disrupting office life.

Like everything related to the wonderful world of the show, this madness could only take time. Netflix is ​​pretty much the only streaming player making money, with the others cutting their losses. Disney recently admitted it lost nearly four million subscribers in the first half of 2023. The site of Bry-sur-Marne, which hosted the filming of the latest opus of Asterix’s adventures, will have to protect its ever-threatening village for a long time. yet.