A group touring the state Capitol on Monday might have seen more than they bargained for as their visit coincided with a racy movie shoot.
The film “Ride Along 2” set up the second floor Capitol rotunda as a night club — complete with bar, liquor bottles, red mood lighting, strobe lights and tables, chairs and comfy sofas.
Extras, dressed for a night out, were brought in for the shoot. The movie, to be set in Miami, is filming at the Capitol through Aug. 8. It has also filmed elsewhere in downtown Atlanta and in Decatur.
The film, starring Kevin Hart, Ice Cube and Olivia Munn, raised a few eyebrows among state employees. One veteran Legislative aide questioned the propriety of creating a bar in the historic rotunda, where former governors, U.S. senators, Coretta Scott King and Confederate President Jefferson Davis lay in state upon their death.
The employee, who feared reprisal if her name was used, said the filming was a distraction. “It’s a working Capitol,” she said.
Film crews also removed part of the ceiling from a first floor storage room to add strobe lights that shot upward through glass tiles on the floor of the rotunda, one story above. They also removed several portraits from third floor walls and the paintings could be seen stacked in an alcove.
The film is not the first to film in the Capitol, nor is it the first to build a bar as part of the set. The NBC television show “Revolution,” built a tavern in the north wing of the Capitol, between the Governor’s Office and the Secretary of State’s Office.
The production company behind “Ride Along 2,” RA 2 Productions, is being charged $5,000 per day to use the Capitol, plus additional expenses, such as the cost of additional security and state personnel.
Georgia’s film industry has exploded in recent years after lawmakers, upstairs in the Capitol’s third floor, approved expansive tax credits to lure productions. Gov. Nathan Deal, an avid supporter of the credits, announced Tuesday that the industry had a $5.1 billion impact on the state economy in the fiscal year that ended June 30.
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