New Jersey residents have gotten an unexpected front row seat to major Hollywood production this summer, as stars Daniel Radcliffe and Jonathan Groff have been spotted filming their upcoming Vietnam War psychological thriller “Trust the Man” at locations throughout the state. Written and directed by Will Graham, the film has quietly turned several quiet New Jersey suburbs into active movie sets over the past several weeks, giving local residents a genuine glimpse behind the curtain of a major studio production unfolding right in their own neighborhoods.
The film itself centers on an ambitious U.S. Army Intelligence officer assigned to investigate a highly decorated soldier harboring a deeply mysterious, hidden past at the height of the Vietnam War. As the investigation deepens into increasingly intense surveillance and military interrogation, the line separating professional duty from genuine psychological obsession begins to blur entirely, pulling both men into a volatile, uncontrollable personal connection that drives the film’s central tension.
The project carries genuine star power well beyond its two leads’ individual reputations, marking a high profile reunion for Radcliffe and Groff following their work together in the critically acclaimed, Tony winning Broadway revival of “Merrily We Roll Along.” Groff joined the “Trust the Man” cast this past June, stepping into the production after original cast member Lucas Hedges departed due to a scheduling conflict, giving the film an added layer of anticipation among fans eager to see the two actors share the screen again after their celebrated stage collaboration.
New Jersey locals first caught wind of the production on Thursday, July 9, 2026, when Radcliffe and Groff were spotted filming an outdoor scene on a blocked off street in Montclair, an unexpected sighting that quickly generated local buzz once residents realized exactly who was working just outside their own front doors. The production’s New Jersey footprint continues to expand from there, with a single day shoot scheduled for Wednesday, July 29, 2026, at the oceanfront Charloy Motel in Seaside Park. For that specific shoot, local police are expected to temporarily block off surrounding streets, a precaution taken specifically to prevent modern vehicles from accidentally intruding on the film’s carefully recreated 1960s and 1970s period setting. Principal photography began at the start of summer and is expected to continue tracking across a range of indoor and outdoor locations throughout New Jersey over the coming months, meaning residents in other towns may well find themselves with their own unexpected celebrity sighting before filming wraps.
New Jersey’s growing appeal as a filming destination reflects considerably more than simple convenience or coincidence. The production is capitalizing directly on the state’s aggressive digital media tax credit program, a set of incentives specifically designed to draw major studio productions away from traditional filming hubs like New York and Georgia. That tax advantage is arriving alongside genuinely significant local film infrastructure investment as well, including Netflix’s recent completion of the structural framework for its upcoming billion dollar production facility at Fort Monmouth, alongside the ongoing construction of the massive 1888 Studios campus in Bayonne. Taken together, those developments reflect New Jersey’s rapid transformation into a genuine East Coast production powerhouse, one increasingly capable of competing directly with the country’s most established filmmaking centers.
For New Jersey residents, “Trust the Man” offers a genuinely tangible example of what that broader industry shift looks like up close, a major studio thriller starring two celebrated actors filming directly in local suburbs and along the Jersey Shore, all made possible by a combination of state tax incentives and a rapidly expanding production infrastructure that shows little sign of slowing down. As filming continues moving between locations across the state in the months ahead, New Jersey residents in towns yet to host a shoot may want to keep an eye out, since the state’s suburbs have quickly become an active backdrop for exactly the kind of Hollywood production once reserved almost entirely for New York and Los Angeles.
