Jack Ryan drama filmed Morocco as Middle East

Though the production was based in Montreal, the team spent around two months filming on location in Morocco, doubling the north-west African country for Yemen, Iraq, Turkey and Syria.

“Everything was filmed within a manageable distance of Marrakech,” said Christian McWilliams, supervising location manager on the Morocco leg of the shoot, in comments to KFTV.

“We set up different types of markets for scenes set in Iraq and Yemen, used the beaches for Turkey and deserts became stand-ins for Syria.”

Morocco is one of the most popular non-US locations for North American productions seeking desert visuals and easy stand-ins for Middle Eastern story settings.

In the Mediterranean, Malta is another popular US choice and Greece may also be emerging. The country launched a formal filming incentive earlier this year and parts of Athens stood in for Middle Eastern locations in the shoot for upcoming BBC drama The Little Drummer Girl.

The new Jack Ryan series used Montreal in Canada as a production base and used the city’s sound stages. Scenes were also shot in Washington, DC. The US capital is not generally known as a film-friendly location but does sometimes attract high-profile shoots. Superhero sequel Wonder Woman 1984 is filming in and around the city this summer.

Paramount Television and Skydance Television produced Tom Clancy’s Jack Ryan for Amazon and the show marks the first time the Jack Ryan character has appeared in a TV series. Chris Pine starred in the most recent film, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit, in 2014.

Tom Clancy's Jack Ryan has already been commissioned for a second series and Colombia is being considered as a key filming location.

See KFTV's production guide for more on filming in Morocco.

Images: Amazon Studios