Rene Veluzat’s world-famous Blue Cloud Movie Ranch in Saugus is on the market with an asking price of $7.5 million.
Listed for sale Jan. 3, the ranch on Blue Cloud Road (off of Bouquet) has been home to numerous motion pictures and series including “Zero Dark Thirty,” “Iron Man” and HBO’s “True Blood.”
Portion of Afghanistan town at Rene Veluzat’s Blue Cloud Movie Ranch
The 94-acre ranch includes an Afghanistan town set that has been used not only in film production, but also as a training ground by the U.S. military.
Blue Cloud one of several Santa Clarita Valley motion picture properties owned by various Veluzat family members. Rene’s brothers, Andre and Renaud Veluzat, own Melody Ranch in Placerita Canyon and the “Big Ranch” in Haskell Canyon. They’re not associated with Blue Cloud.
Neither Rene Veluzat nor the listing agent, Gail Kopp of Realty Executives, said they could discuss details. Veluzat said he was in talks with studio officials.
The potential sale of Blue Cloud has been rumored ever since the release of the controversial 2012 film, “Innocence of Muslims,” which was filmed there. Some blamed the film for the deadly attacks on U.S. diplomats in Benghazi, Libya; the Arab news agency Al-Jazeera reported the next day that the four Americans died “during a protest against an amateur film deemed offensive to Islam’s prophet, Muhammad.”
The property is located in an unincorporated part of Saugus but the city of Santa Clarita is in the process of annexing it.
“They’ll be annexed into the Movie Ranch Overlay Zone, which is a mechanism the city has to promote and encourage filming by reducing the cost of fliming,” said Jason Crawford, the city’s economic development manager.
“We’re in the final stages,” he said of the annexation. “That process did start over a year ago, and will finish in the next month.”
The planned 824-acre “North Saugus” annexation cleared the Planning Commission in September 2012 and received approval from the City Council last March.
Perry Smith at Hometownstation.com contributed to this story.