Hollywood Has Left L.A.

Despite fake footage circulated during the 2025 Los Angeles wildfires, the iconic Hollywood sign did not burn down—it still stands, overlooking the city. But Hollywood, the industry, has dried up. “What began years ago as a trickle has suddenly become an exodus,” writes Lane Brown in Vulture. “Today, only about a fifth of American movies and shows are filmed in L.A.” The past decade has been especially tough for the film and TV industry, as production has moved to other cities and countries that attract crews with better tax credits. The wildfires in January only worsened the trend, leaving more industry professionals to question “whether it’s worth it to live in a city that’s harder to shoot in and now more frequently on fire.” Can Los Angeles—and California—lure talent back?

One crew member, who asked to remain anonymous for fear of jeopardizing future employment, says he moved from his hometown of Atlanta to L.A. in 2015 hoping to break into postproduction but couldn’t get a foot in the door. “I was working in a noodle shop to survive, and I was like, This sucks,” he says. He moved back to Atlanta, which had become a production hot spot, and almost immediately found himself in demand as a second camera assistant. Between 2017 and 2022, he says, he worked steadily on major TV shows and blockbuster films. “I could go out to a bar in Atlanta and there would be three different crews from three different TV shows there, and once, without even trying, I came home with a job.” Then came the 2023 strikes and the streaming contraction. Stranger Things, which had filmed five seasons in Atlanta, wrapped its final one in 2024. Marvel left the state. Local crew members had to compete for dwindling jobs with Californians and New Yorkers who had moved to Atlanta during the boom. “Things still haven’t picked up,” he says. “I have friends ask me why I can’t just get another job. I tell them, ‘Imagine if you were an accountant and every accounting job suddenly moved out of the country.’ ”