Screen star: The Gothic Cathedral of St Elisabeth in Košice. (source: TASR)
THE GOTHIC Cathedral of St Elisabeth in Košice was the backdrop for a major foreign TV production that transformed the cathedral into a landmark of the fictional English medieval town of Kingsbridge for five days at the end of October. The shooting involved a crew of 250, more than a hundred extras, 50 trucks with props, and took a week of preparations.
“We had long been searching for a good site for shooting scenes in the series that occur after the collapse of a bridge in Kingsbridge, when injured persons are brought into a church. St Elisabeth’s Cathedral (Dóm Sv Alžbety) in Košice was ideal for this production as it has been preserved in almost its original Gothic form,” Rola Bauer, the mini-series’ executive producer, told the TASR newswire on October 25. Producer Howard Ellis said that the rest of shooting was done in Hungary, where a small medieval town was built as a set.
“When shooting in different places in Europe, we cooperate with local production companies that know the environment, the situation, and so forth,” the producer added.
Dalibor Vasica, who represents a Slovak production company in Košice, told TASR that several localities were shown to the British producers, including Bojnice Castle, but that Košice’s cathedral was chosen, adding that this was the biggest filmed production ever undertaken in Slovakia.
The mini-series, entitled World Without End, is being financed by three production companies – Tandem Communications, Scott Free Films and Take 5 Productions – and has a total budget of $44 million dollars. Director Michael Caton Jones chose several stars for the cast, including Cynthia Nixon, Ben Chaplin and Miranda Richardson.
The mini-series should premiere in the second half of of 2012.
Representatives of the city of Košice reported that they were pleased that the filming permits the city, which becomes a European Capital of Culture in 2013, to further present itself around the world.
