From: ahk@chinet.com   
      
   radioactiveseattle@gmail.com wrote:   
      
   >Do any of y'all happen to know why the producers and/or director of   
   >"Groundhog Day" didn't shoot the film in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.   
   >The town you see in the film is actually Woodstock, Illinois, a small   
   >burg a few hours from Chicago or St. Louis.   
      
   It's no where near St. Louis. Chicago and St. Louis are 300 miles apart.   
      
   It's 40 miles northwest of downtown Chicago. It's the county seat of   
   McHenry County and one of the buildings seen in the town square is the   
   former courthouse. Another building is the famous opera house, still in   
   use, built in the "operetta" era, so works of Gilbert and Sullivan would   
   have been performed there when they were brand new. In fact, years ago,   
   I attended a performance of The Mikado by the resident opera company there.   
      
   The county government complex hasn't been in downtown Woodstock in   
   decades. It's moved to an outlying area with lots of parking.   
      
   >Why go to all the trouble (AND expense) of building a set there to mimic   
   >Baldknobber's Hill--or whatever it's properly called--rather than just   
   >cajoling the town fathers of Punxsutawney into allowing them to shoot   
   >there?   
      
   I don't believe there was any serious negotiation about filming on   
   location there. The movie's production was Chicago-based because of the   
   Chicago connections of those producing, writing, and directing the film.   
   Also, you might have noticed that it was filled with actors who were   
   either literally based in Chicago or who came from Chicago or had a   
   significant portion of their professional career in Chicago.   
      
   Chicago has a very large number of theater actors, so it's long been   
   practical to produce movies and tv shows here without putting a large   
   number of out-of-towners in the cast up in hotel rooms.   
      
   >. . .   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)