Copyright The New York Times
Diane McArter runs Furlined, a company that makes commercials for companies like Apple and Eli Lilly, from Los Angeles. But not much of her filming happens in the city, a longtime center for commercial production, anymore. In the past two months alone, she left Los Angeles to shoot in Glasgow, Prague, Mexico City and Toronto instead. “That’s several million dollars of production going offshore,” Ms. McArter said. In Hollywood, commercial advertising has long been overshadowed by the far more glamorous film and television work. Less art, more commerce. Yet for decades, crew members have counted on commercial production shoots either as their sole source of income or as a way to pay the bills between lulls in film and television production. Just like television and film shoots, though, commercial production in Los Angeles has plummeted. Production in the third quarter of this year was 18 percent lower than last year, and 40 percent lower than the five-year average, according to a new report from FilmLA, the local government organization that tracks production in the area. That has left a gaping hole in the longtime safety net for industry workers in the area just as those workers need it the most. And unlike for television and film, state lawmakers have not come to the rescue. A bill passed this year in California gives millions in tax breaks to production done in the state — but it excludes commercial work.
