FilmTexas

FilmTexas was the newsletter of the Texas Film Commission, the state office whose early goals were to bring outside productions to Texas locations and to grow a homegrown industry. It is the earliest Texas film trade publication this research could document.

A December 1972 issue, which the commission reprinted for its 50th anniversary, argued that Texas needed reliable, accessible information about its own industry so that productions could hire Texans in every phase of the work. That argument led to the Texas Production Manual, an annual book of Texas crew members by region and specialty with credits and contacts, along with equipment houses and other vendors, location and weather information, and local liaisons. The manual stayed in print until 2008, when it became the online Texas Production Directory that the commission still runs.

The newsletter itself ran production news. Its Summer 1986 edition reported on Texas Chainsaw Massacre 2, the TV series Dallas and RoboCop, and on its front page told readers that publication was being suspended for the foreseeable future. The editors wrote that they had been gratified that many competing film commissions had praised and copied the publication. A scan of that issue is posted in the commission's From the Archives series.