Could the Kitsap and Olympic Peninsulas Become Filmmaking Hotspots?

This article originally appeared in our sister publication, South Sound.

When Patrick Sheehan was growing up in Bremerton, he and his friends often spent their free time shooting amateur movies around the Port of Brownsville pavilion. Decades later, Sheehan is spearheading an organization, the Peninsula Film Commission, he’s hoping will encourage others to tap into that same creative spirit on a larger regional scale. 

“I am starting this film commission here on the Olympic (and) Kitsap Peninsulas to kind of galvanize the cities together in order to make it a better apparatus for productions to come and shoot,” he said of the organization, which recently received 501(c)(6) and IRS approval.

Splitting his time between Los Angeles and Kitsap County, Writers Guild of America member Sheehan is bringing with him 20 years of experience in the entertainment industry, where he says he’s done basically “every job up and down the call sheet.” (Recent projects of note include the Questlove-directed documentary “Sly Lives! (aka the Burden of Black Genius),” on which he has a producer credit; the forthcoming Apple TV+ adaptation of the William Gibson novel “Neuromancer,” whose script department he worked in; and Slamdance Film Festival, for which he does programming.)

“The interesting thing about Hollywood right now is you go to Hollywood and it’s really a place where people come from everywhere to kind of meld together,” he said. “Once you kind of see behind the curtain of how Hollywood works, it becomes very demystified, right? The competency levels are similar to everywhere else, here included. And one of the main things I want to do with the commission is demystify the business and make it less intimidating for people.”

The Peninsula Film Commission is introducing itself amid a precarious time in Hollywood, when productions are increasingly leaving the city due to high costs and decamping to states such as New Mexico and cities like Atlanta. The Hollywood Reporter found, for instance, that in the fourth quarter of 2025, California saw a 20% decrease in movie and TV-project filming in the state year-over-year, and that production costs of those projects were down some 22%.

“Now, with Hollywood the way it is, people can compete with Hollywood,” he said. “People can do this from anywhere, in many circumstances.” 

Sheehan commended the preexisting efforts of Washington Filmworks, an organization that offers cash-back incentives and other kinds of support for filmmakers shooting their projects in the state. (“Train Dreams,” which was nominated in four categories at the 98th Academy Awards, is one recent feature that successfully took part in that organization’s Production Incentive Program.) Part of Sheehan’s model involves urging creatives to work with Washington Filmworks’ resources.

Sheehan said the Peninsula Film Commission will have two “pockets.” One of them is its services pocket, where the goal is to simplify the permitting process and help nail down shooting locations. The other is its membership pocket, which is geared toward businesses, individuals, students, and other demographic categories and will offer free gear rentals; connect local talents with one another; and host workshops on everything from, say, making your home amenable to a crew to showing those newer to the industry the ins and outs of production assistance. Sheehan said he additionally wants to leverage specific preexisting skill sets for production purposes.

“If you’re a great carpenter, you can easily be a set builder,” he noted. “A lot of people don’t know this. If you’re a driver, and you have a good license, you can be a set driver. If you’re an electrician, you can be a set electrician.”

Sheehan has supporters in Washington Filmworks and Visit Kitsap; he also has several community leaders on his board helping solidify the commission’s work. 

“Hopefully there’ll be some growing partnerships there, but yeah — I’m ready to launch,” he said. “I just need to get to a place where I can do the next phase, which will be canvassing, and that will be where I’m formally, like, getting to work with all the cities and the counties and stuff like that.”

Sheehan is aiming to get the commission to a level where he can more concretely pitch the area to Hollywood executives he has connections to, and where productions are common enough that it would make sense to host an Oscars-style ceremony honoring the best work happening in the region. He wants projects of all sizes to see the Kitsap and Olympic Peninsulas as worthy destinations.

“It’s just like an ember at this one point,” he said, “and hopefully it will catch fire.”