Movie Adaptation of Wild to be Filmed in Oregon

The movie, starring Reese Witherspoon as Portlander Cheryl Strayed, will be filmed in Oregon this fall.

By Rebecca Jacobson
A source has confirmed to WW that the movie adaptation of Wild, Cheryl Strayed’s memoir about hiking part of the Pacific Crest Trail, will be filmed in Oregon.
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According to the source, filming will begin in late September or early October and will take place in and around Portland and Mount Hood. More arid parts of the state will likely double for northern California. Because Strayed’s 1,100-mile solo journey ended at the Bridge of the Gods, that other Columbia River crossing will probably appear in the movie.

Though not a multimillion-dollar blockbuster, the project will still fill a void for local film crew, according to the source. Last summer, three projects—Grimm, Portlandia and Leverage—were shot in Portland, but Leverage was cancelled last winter. By securing Wild, the source added, it's clear Oregon has the necessary talent to support two to three simultaneous projects, which wasn’t true several years ago.

No director has yet been attached to the project.

WWeek 2015

Rebecca Jacobson

Rebecca Jacobson

Rebecca Jacobson is a writer from Portland (OK, she was born in Seattle but has been in Oregon since the day after she turned 10) who's also lived in Berlin, Malawi and Rhode Island. While on staff at Willamette Week, she covered theater, film, bikes, drug dealers-turned-barbers and little-known scraps of local history.

Willamette Week’s reporting has real-life impact that changes laws, forces action by civic leaders, and drives compromised politicians from public office.

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