The palace every period drama wants, and a region of châteaux, forests, new towns and studios within an hour of our Paris office. Outside the city limits, the Paris film office has no say. Here is who does, starting with Versailles, where you shoot on Mondays and at night.
The City of Paris film office clears the streets of Paris, and only Paris. Step over the boulevard périphérique and every town in Île-de-France is its own permit authority, with its own town hall, its own forms and its own clock. Versailles, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Fontainebleau, the Seine-Saint-Denis towns around the Olympic venues: each one is a separate file.
The regional film agency, Film Paris Région, helps you navigate that map. It lists around 2,400 locations in its database, three quarters of them outside Paris, and filming contacts in more than 200 communes. On top of the towns sit the operators: national palaces and museums, the forestry office for state forests, private estates, rail and road owners.
We are a production service company working across France from Paris and Cannes. Île-de-France is our home ground: the crew is the Paris crew, without hotels or per diems, and Zacharie can run a day at Versailles and a day in the city from the same unit base. Élie files the town halls and the operators in parallel.
The palace hosts only a handful of fiction projects a year and does not close to the public for a shoot. Filming happens mainly when the château is closed to visitors: on Mondays, and at night. In practice, crews arrive on the Sunday evening, shoot through the Monday, and must be gone before the doors open on Tuesday. The palace's filming team coordinates the wardens, fire safety, the fountain keepers if you need the basins filled, and the gardeners. Large crews can be accommodated, but the private apartments are the hardest rooms to get, because they cannot hold a full unit and its kit. Any request to change the normal state of the rooms is reviewed by the museum's management. Plan your schedule around Mondays first, and your story second.
Île-de-France is where feature films and TV series find their palaces and forests, where commercials find suburban streets, business districts and new towns that look like nowhere in particular, and where the Olympic venues are now in everyday use. For many briefs it is the cheapest way to "leave Paris" on screen: the crew sleeps at home, the kit comes from the same Paris rental houses, and the lead times are town-hall lead times, not Paris ones.
For a shoot inside Paris itself, the rules are on our Paris page, and for a spot specifically, on shooting a commercial in Paris. For châteaux further out, see the Loire Valley.
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Through the palace's own filming team, not the town or the Paris film office. Filming takes place mainly when the palace is closed to visitors, on Mondays and at night, because the château does not close to the public for a shoot. Availability around restorations, events and school visits decides the date, so ask early. Requests to change the normal state of the rooms are reviewed by the museum's management.
No. Paris Film covers the City of Paris only. Every other commune in Île-de-France issues its own permits through its town hall. The regional film agency, Film Paris Région, lists filming contacts in more than 200 communes and can help identify the right desk.
Indicatively 2 to 4 weeks for a town's streets, 3 to 5 for a state forest through ONF, and 4 to 10 for national palaces and museums, confirmed per project. Filed in parallel, the slowest desk sets the date.
Yes, with the agreement of ONF, the national forestry office, which manages state forests with a named referent per massif. The château of Fontainebleau is a separate request to its operator, and the town's streets a third, to the town hall.
Île-de-France is our home ground. Crew and kit come from Paris without hotels or per diems for most locations, which is why it is often the most economical way to get châteaux, forests and suburbs on screen. We quote per project in euros.
Send your dates, the locations outside the city limits and the size of your crew. We tell you who decides for each one.
Or email [email protected]. We reply within 3 hours.