On a typical Thursday morning on Spanish Street in Cape Girardeau, there is not much activity. A few cars and people may be moving up and down the street, but nothing stands out.
On this particular Thursday morning, however, the streets were lined with cars, both parked and moving. In various places along the side of the road were metal boxes with "Paskal Lighting" painted on the back and three pronged outlets in the front. Beside the boxes were bundles of cords.
Plain white semitrailer trucks were parked along the street and workers climbed in and out of the trailers to retrieve equipment. Farther down the street there were powered lifts and ladders scattered around a bar aptly named "The Bar."
Workers were cleaning, painting and putting the finishing touches on "The Bar," while two men standing at the top of the hill near the courthouse gazebo painted signs with long handled paint rollers.
"The Bar," now located on Spanish Street, was an empty building before work began on it in recent weeks. Now, it's going to be a main location for a Hollywood film.
A city that normally doesn't receive much attention is now in the spotlight as 20th Century Fox films its upcoming feature film "Gone Girl."
"Gone Girl" is based on the New York Times bestselling novel of the same title by Gillian Flynn. It is a thriller that revolves around the struggling marriage of Nick and Amy Dunne. Amy goes missing on the couple's fifth wedding anniversary. Nick is the prime suspect since he used her money to open "The Bar" and increased her life insurance policy after he was fired from his job.
The film adaptation of "Gone Girl" is being directed by David Fincher, who is an Oscar-nominated director known for films such as "Fight Club," "The Social Network" and "The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo," and is being produced by actress Reese Witherspoon.
Ben Affleck is playing the role of Nick and Rosamund Pike is playing the role of Amy. Neil Patrick Harris and Tyler Perry are two other big name actors who will appear in the film.
"Basically [I'm excited] because it will bring interest to Cape Girardeau," Southeast freshman Antonio Gherardini said. "You Google 'Gone Girl' and the first suggestion that comes up is 'Gone Girl Cape Girardeau,' and usually that's attention that we don't get."
There have been multiple casting calls in Cape Girardeau for the film, a few of which were held at Rose Theatre on Southeast Missouri State University's campus. Thousands of people attended the casting calls.
"When we sponsored a casting call for the first time and second time the amount of people that ran through here was over 4,000 over those periods of time," said Dr. Jim Dufek, professor of mass media at Southeast.
"We had open casting calls but then we had callbacks. We had specific [casting calls] where we were looking just for theater students, we were looking just for babies, we were looking for men and women over 30 and then we had the open casting calls. So we tallied up all of the numbers and we saw, literally, several thousands of people. That doesn't include what they had at the mall, and that doesn't include what they had online."
Many downtown businesses are reaping the benefits of 20th Century Fox being in their district. Two stores in particular, Annie Laurie's Antiques and Spanish Street Mercantile, have seen an increase in traffic. Both stores have sold items to the film crew that are expected to be used on the set.
"They are business. They've bought a lot from us as far as props and things like that," said Charles Bertrand, the owner of Spanish Street Mercantile.
"They've been a business in itself. We've sold them a lot of merchandise, rented a lot of merchandise to them. As far as volumes of people, people coming to see what's going on, you know, it's been good, but most of them are sight seeing. Our biggest business is from out of town in the antique shop, so people don't really know that we're filming a movie here until they get down here. It's been good for that because it's a tourist attraction."
Laurie Everett, owner of Annie Laurie's Antiques, mentioned that there has been increased traffic downtown, and that it seems that there have been more customers coming into her store now that "Gone Girl" is being filmed in the area.
Aside from the casting calls, social media has also been abuzz with people claiming to have seen Affleck. An image began circulating on the internet of Affleck standing in front of the river wall in downtown Cape Girardeau. The image has since been proven to be a fabricated picture. Now Facebook, Twitter and all other social media outlets are populated with actual photos of Affleck working out at Fitness Plus in Cape Girardeau and rumored sightings of Neil Patrick Harris at Starbucks.
"I talked to a friend last night. She and her husband were just starstruck that Ben Affleck was at the store, and he went to Starbucks," Dufek said. "My friend's friend said that she made a cup of coffee for Neil Patrick Harris and oh my God they were just giddy. So I guess it's just [being] starstruck. You see them on TV and then you actually get to see them in person and they have that connection. We all know that the media give us that connection. We see them all the time, and we think that we're friends because we see them repetitively."
Many members of the community have received roles in "Gone Girl" as extras.
"It was quick," said Emily Scifers, a salesperson at Annie Laurie's and a former Southeast student. "They called me on a Tuesday and were like 'Can you come in on Friday? We'll call you later with the time.' She called me with the time and then she told me everything that I needed to wear, this is what we want you to wear, really muted tones, nothing fancy, and show up at noon. I went there and it was just so cool, like, it's super professional. Everybody's really, really nice, and it's like a smooth-run machine. It's so organized."
"Gone Girl" is being filmed in various places in downtown Cape Girardeau and is expected to continue filming until Oct. 23. The movie is expected to be released late next year.
"It's kind of surreal, I guess, because you don't get to see them," said Randy Tapley, a TV & film student at Southeast. "It hasn't really hit that they're here and that this is actually happening. Like, when it comes out in theaters, I think it will be more like 'That's Cape.'"
