According to Deadline, the Livingston, Montana city commission unanimously moved Saturday to temporarily suspend the filming permit for the Daily Wire's "Pawn Shop," the pro-ICE action picture that was supposed to shoot through October 10 in the downtown. The city wants a legal opinion on whether to amend, suspend, or revoke the permit, with a return to the commission due by 5pm tomorrow.
The production is Bonfire Pawn Shop LLC, a Ben Shapiro machine, and a call sheet seen by Deadline lists Danny Trejo, Harvey Keitel, and Henry Thomas. That's the kid from E.T., reprising his career as a small-town witness to chaos. The team's last picture got picketed by IATSE, the crew walked off, and the producers told everyone they "don't negotiate with communists." So the next town they pick is a small town in Montana. Of course it is.
Here is the mechanism: the film needs a town, and the town gets blank gunshots, pyrotechnics, and a staged car wreck in the front yards without being told. Road closures and armed security made it harder for the city's only food bank to get its clients across the street. The police chief says complaints came in "on a daily basis." And the opening scene, per Deadline, appears to dramatize the January fatal shooting of Renée Good. That's a lot of creative content for a town that never signed up.
Livingston's answer is the most democratic thing in this whole story: a permit with a pulse. The commission didn't cancel the movie. They didn't even demand a statement. They asked for the stunt plan.
YOUR TURN: Is "wait, we want to see the stunt plan first" a protest, or is it just how towns work?
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