Memphis vies for movie on Johnny Cash

The movie biography is titled “Walk the Line,” and is scheduled to cost 20th Century Fox’s “Fox 2000” division roughly $28 million.

The movie aims to chronicle the late singer’s life, from his days on a cotton farm in Arkansas in the late 1940s to his early stardom with Sun Records in Memphis to his troubled time as a superstar in Nashville in the late 1960s.

Cash, died Sept. 12 at 71, four months after his wife of 35 years, June Carter Cash died at 73.

Despite all the time Cash spent in Tennessee, Memphis is no lock to be the location for shooting the picture.

Linn Sitler of the Memphis & Shelby County Film and Television Commission says Louisiana is trying to outbid Memphis with tax breaks and incentives.

“The filmmakers want to shoot in Tennessee, but it’s the studio’s final decision,” Sitler said.

She said Memphis, home to Graceland, even lost out in its bid last year to be the set for “Elvis Has Left the Building,” with Sean Astin and Kim Basinger.

“We lost an Elvis movie, of all things,” Sitler said. “‘Elvis Has Left the Building’ left the state and went to New Mexico.”

Sitler said she’s lobbying state lawmakers to cut filmmakers a special deal for shooting in Tennessee.

“It would be a shame if the Johnny Cash movie were not filmed in Tennessee,” said Rep. Mike Kernell, D-Memphis. “It’s a matter of pride in our state, and a matter of showing ourselves to the world.”

The Cash movie is titled after “I Walk the Line,” the singer’s 1956 hit for Sun Records of Memphis.