Threat In Baltimore Halts Filming Of Apple TV+ Natalie Portman Series

BALTIMORE, MD — An Apple TV+ series filming in Baltimore came to a halt Friday after several people threatened to shoot producers and extort them out of thousands of dollars, multiple news outlets report.

The new limited series, "Lady in the Lake," starring Academy Award winner Natalie Portman has been filming in Baltimore since April, the Maryland Economic Development Association confirmed.

According to WBFF, the film crew was filming around 4 p.m. in the 200 block of Park Avenue downtown when the producers were approached by several people who demanded they stop filming or they'd shoot someone.

“The leaders of the production decided to err on the side of caution and reschedule the shoot after they found another location,” Baltimore Police Department spokesperson James Moses told The Baltimore Banner.

The media outlet said the "threat-makers" also tried to extort $50,000 from the crew; however, the producers declined to pay it.

It's not clear if Portman was present when the encounter occurred.

A description of the people who threatened the film crew was not immediately available. Patch has reached out to the Baltimore Police Department for additional information.

“Lady in the Lake” is an adaptation of Laura Lippman’s New York Times best-selling novel of the same name.

The limited series takes place in 1960s Baltimore, where an unsolved murder pushes housewife and mother Maddie Schwartz (Portman) to reinvent her life as an investigative journalist and sets her on a collision course with Cleo Sherwood (Baltimore native Moses Ingram), a hard-working woman juggling motherhood, many jobs and a passionate commitment to advancing Baltimore’s Black progressive agenda, according to an Apple press release.

“We are proud to welcome Endeavor Content to Maryland, as it films its new limited series over the next six months,” said Maryland Commerce Secretary Mike Gill. “With help from our Maryland Film Office and our partners at the Baltimore Film Office, we look forward to seeing a successful production and positive economic impact around the region.”

Lippman was a reporter for 20 years, including 12 years at The Baltimore Sun. She published seven books about “accidental PI” Tess Monaghan before leaving daily journalism in 2001, according to her biography. Her work has received multiple national awards, and Lippman was the first recipient of the Mayor’s Prize for Literary Excellence and the first genre writer recognized as Author of the Year by the Maryland Library Association.