Natalie Portman’s Apple TV+ Series Shut Down After Baltimore Locals “Threatened To Shoot Someone”

Production on Natalie Portman‘s upcoming Apple TV+ series Lady in the Lake shut down on Friday after receiving a threat to its Baltimore set. According to the Los Angeles Times, city locals “threatened to shoot someone” on the Lady in the Lake series if they didn’t stop filming.

The individuals behind the threat — described in a Baltimore Police Department statement as “the locals,” described by the Baltimore Banner as “drug dealers” — threatened producers and tried to extort money from the production. They said they would return to production and “shoot someone” if filming continued on the 200 block of Park Avenue, per the LA Times.

If producers paid the locals $50,000, they said they would “allow the production to continue,” per the report obtained by the Times.

Chakia Fennoy, a spokesperson for Baltimore PD, told the outlet that producers shut down production “to err on the side of caution,” adding that the Lady in the Lake team chose to “reschedule the shoot after they found another location.”

Lady in the Lake is based on the novel of the same name by Laura Lippman. David Simon, The Wire creator and Lippman’s husband, responded to a tweet from CBS Baltimore reporting the Friday incident by sharing his own experience filming a series in the Maryland city.

“Not my production. Don’t know all details. But we shot 200 hours of television over two decades. Communicated where we shot,” he wrote. “Always a few loudmouths hyping; always folks in crew –locations, security, BPD — trained to firmly but respectfully respond. Baltimore is good people.”

Portman stars in Lady in the Lake and is an executive producer on the series, which follows housewife-turned-journalist Maddie Schwartz (Portman), who sets out to solve the murder of a mother and activist in 1960s Baltimore. The series also stars The Queen’s Gambit actress Moses Ingram, plus Mike Epps and Noah Jupe.