Downtown Covington

Hey, y’all, guess what? Covington, Georgia is known as the Hollywood of the South! Yep, loads of scenes from TV shows and movies were filmed right there on the downtown square. Currently, «The Vampire Diaries» is in production and I’m still waiting for «The Walking Dead» to film some flashback scenes there. It all started with «The Dukes of Hazard» in 1978 and the Southern breakin’ the law shows kept going in the late 1980’s with «In the Heat of the Night» (side note: my husband, as a highschooler, once delivered a pizza to Carroll O’Connor at his Conyers residence back in the day).
Some of the movies filmed in Covington I recognize are:
American Reunion (the American Pie sequel)
Footloose (the remake)
Sweet Home Alabama
Remember the Titans
My Cousin Vinny
Cannonball Run
And there are several others. I visited on the first day of filming of «Selma,» an Oprah Winfrey-​Brad Pitt produced Martin Luther King Jr. biopic focused on the voting-​rights marches Dr. King led in Alabama.
When it’s not playing host to Hollywood’s elite, Covington’s downtown square is the quintessential Southern small town square. Many of the businesses on the Square are family owned and operated and have been in business for decades. Others are newer and hipper. Like many of Georgia’s towns, Covington was a stop on General Sherman’s March to the Sea during the Civil War. The city was looted, of course, but somehow the stately courthouse on the Square and many of the beautiful antebellum homes just a couple of blocks off the Square were spared from being burned and are still standing today.
So if you find yourself driving down I-​20 and have some time to spare for a meal, coffee, ice cream, a haircut, or just a history lesson, exit off and make your way to the Square. Who knows, you might bump into someone famous.