California Couple Opening Schoolyard Studio in Burton
The first phase of getting Schoolyard Studio — the former Berkshire High School — up and running is to install the elephant doors.
The first phase of getting Schoolyard Studio — the former Berkshire High School — up and running is to install the elephant doors.
Opening a wall of the former gymnasium to accommodate the 16-foot-by-18-foot doors will allow production companies to bring in equipment and sets for filming or recording in one of the stages planned for the huge building, said Dat Chansamone.
He and his wife, Kiyomi, bought the school on about 6 acres in October, but had been working with a real estate company since before they visited in June.
“I didn’t know he’d been looking for a big place for a long time,” Kiyomi said as the couple prepared for the studio’s grand opening Nov. 11.
Dat (pronounced Date) said he’d read a story about someone who bought an old school to turn into a recording studio and it caught his imagination.
“There was nothing available in California,” he said of their home state.
Property there is too expensive for a start-up operation, so he looked farther afield and saw online the school in Burton Village was up for sale, he said.
They contacted Hanna Commercial Real Estate agent Lori O’Neill and the scene was set.
“It’s a beautifully-kept school,” Kiyomi said.
Other than installing an elephant door, Dat said he doesn’t expect to make a lot of changes to the basic building.
The lobby remains a lobby and the gym, once it is soundproofed, will become a film stage. Locker rooms can be the “green rooms,” where actors prepare to go on stage, Dat said.
Various parts of the building, such as hallways and a few classrooms, will be available for shooting scenes and the upstairs classrooms will become quarters for production crews when they are on-site for a while, he said.
If the elephant door is ready to open in March, the couple hopes to hear “Action!” in the spring.
Asked when they will start to take bookings from producers, Kiyomi responded enthusiastically, “Now!”
Warm Welcome
Familiar with the community and excited by the Chansamons’ project, O’Neill has been lending her background in communications, public relations and advertising to the effort.
“When Dat found this listing online, we started a dialogue and really hit it off,” she recalled.
Once she started working with them, she handed the real estate arrangements off to another agent to avoid any conflict of interest, O’Neill said.
There is no formal decision as to Schoolyard Studio’s corporate structure, but she said she is the “general dog’s body” and chief problem solver for the startup operation.
Local curiosity about the fledgling business has drawn people to call Dat or knock on the door to see what is cooking behind the familiar walls of the school, O’Neill said.
“Ohioans genuinely want to help. So many people are happy we’re doing something with it,” she said.
Since word spread about their plans, the couple has discovered some interesting facts.
“We have met a lot of people in L.A. who went to this school. They moved there because there were no jobs (in Ohio),” Kiyomi said before Friday’s open house.
The film industry in California tends to draw the ambitious from all over the country and Geauga County is no exception. The Greater Cleveland Film Commission has been a source for local professionals with roots in the region.
“There is a large community who went to Los Angeles to make it and many have connections here,” Dat said, noting producers Curtis Koller graduated from Berkshire High School and T.J. White, from Cardinal High School, with both living within 20 miles of the Chansamons’ home in a Los Angeles suburb.
“Everyone’s so friendly and warm. We’re getting a lot of support,” Kiyomi said, adding she was born and raised in Los Angeles, but feels very comfortable in Burton.
“I don’t feel misplaced,” she said. “It’s special.”
Getting a Foothold
“We want to keep the history, not really change the building,” Dat said, adding they want to start small and build the studio rental business slowly while producing some of his own content.
“We didn’t go into it as a get-rich-quick,” he said.
Dat is still working virtually as a visual effects artist for Arsenal FX Color Studios and others in Los Angeles. As such, he is familiar with what it takes to set the stage for movies and television productions.
An example of his job was the crowd cheering from the stands in the movie “Seabiscuit.” Only those cheering in the front are actors. It was his job to place film of cheering crowds behind them, Dat said.
He also does visual effects for the television series “Grey’s Anatomy,” Kiyomi said.
After the opening, she planned to return to Los Angeles where their 15-year-old son Taizo, is in school, but Dat will continue to live and work in the studio where there is plenty to do.
The ceiling of the gym needs to be soundproofed, he said. Rain pounding on the roof the day of the event was clearly heard below — background noise that is not compatible with filming.
The big stage won’t take up the entire gym because they want to be able to use part of the area to fulfill their client’s needs.
“We’ve tried to adapt the space to our uses,” Dat said.
The high ceiling in the gym will allow a producer to build a two-story façade of a house including a front room with a staircase, he said.
“That’s why many producers would really have a lot of uses for that (space),” Dat said.
With a rendering of the future layout of the first floor and plenty of ideas and enthusiasm, he is anxious to proceed with phase one of the project.
However, like most construction jobs, there are delays. Getting the big door in place is probably delayed until March.
“Orders are backlogged. We have everything lined up, but we can’t move forward,” Dat said.
Open House Success
O’Neill said attendance at the open house was “fabulous.”
“I bought 120 name tags and we ran out two hours before it ended. We were actually thrilled,” she said. “There’s amazing interest in what we’re doing for the community.”
The warm welcome Kiyomi and Dat received from area residents was encouraging and a number of representatives from the Greater Cleveland Film Commission came to see what a facility the Chansamons are retrofitting to accommodate anyone who wants to record their productions in large or smaller studios.
There is a lot going on with the project and keeping focused on the mission can be a challenge, O’Neill said.
“We have to keep reminding ourselves that, in essence, this is a film production studio for rent,” she said. “We have a 96,000-square-foot box in Burton, so other people can pursue their visions.”
