On the Sunday, before he was inaugurated as the 47th President of the United States, Donald Trump addressed announced a new political designation on stage at the “Make America Great Again Victory Rally” in Washington, D.C.,
Toward the end of his hour-long address, Trump said, “I got Mel Gibson, Sylvester Stallone, and Jon Voight to become ambassadors to Hollywood, Calif., to put it back on track. So, they’re all ambassadors. You have to refer to them as ambassadors, ‘Mr. Ambassador.'”
Trump first signaled his intention to appoint the roster of conservative actors, two of which rose to worldwide fame in the 1980s, to the unprecedented position in a Truth Social post on January 16.
After the announcement, Gibson, who recently lost his Malibu home in the Palisades fire, told Entertainment Weekly that he wasn’t aware Trump would be handing him the new role. Gibson remarked, “Any chance the position comes with an ambassador’s residence?”
Voight also shared his sentiments with Entertainment Weekly, noting, “Very few films are made here now, but we are fortunate to have an incoming President, who wants to restore Hollywood to its former glory, and with his help, I feel we can get done.”
Is Hollywood “dying”?
Only Hollywood would call the offshoring of production a “runaway production.” While poetic, it describes something far more practical: films that are conceived of in Hollywood. but made somewhere other than the United States.
Sometimes, demographics provide better casting options for particular stories. In other instances, a production may require locations that exist abroad. But some films or television shows are produced outside of the U.S. due to economics.
Almost as old as Hollywood
While Trump now laments that Hollywood is sending work to “foreign countries,” the phenomenon of outsourcing work first conceived in Hollywood is at least 60 years old. So, when he claims he will bring back “The Golden Age of Hollywood,” one wonders when that era was. That is, because according to a 2002 Reuters article, productions have been offshored at least as far back as 1952, when the Hollywood Film Council of the American Federation of Labor launched a campaign to put a stop to runaway productions.
Then, the committee’s chairman, Dolph Thomas, said he while had no objection to producers shooting abroad to capture authentic backgrounds, “we will try to stop the growing tendency here among Hollywood producers, especially in television, to do their shooting in foreign countries principally to cut costs.”
The response from producers at that time was similar to the one heard today: Either you make these pictures in more cost-effective places or you don’t make them at all. The protests in the 1950s did nothing to halt the exodus. Instead, outsourcing film and TV production continued for the decades that followed.
This debate, of course, mirrors those in other industries that have argued the potential negatives of sending jobs overseas are outweighed by the positives it can bring to businesses on our shores.
What can California do?
One way California has attempted to stave off “runaway productions” is by offering tax incentives. But California’s existing program is capped at $330 million annually, an amount that the film industry claims is not enough to keep business in the Hollywood.
This current incentive also faces a challenge that may not have existed 60 years ago. That is, that while production may not be done overseas, it may still be done in states other than California. Today, many films and TV shows are in New York, Georgia and Louisiana.
And while Governor Gavin Newsom announced a proposal to more than double the size of the state’s film tax incentive program to $750 million annually. The increased cap, which would go in effect in July, would offer more money to entice film productions than any state provides except Georgia. That state provides unlimited credits unlimited tax credits.
Whether that’s enough to keep production within the country is another question. Production levels in the U.S. have dropped sharply over the last three years, in part due to the 2023 strikes but also amid an industrywide contraction. Hollywood unions have also pointed to the lucrative incentives offered by the U.K., Canada, Australia, and others that have lured productions overseas.
What can a president do?
In October, then Congressman Adam Schiff (now Senator) signaled support on Thursday for a federal incentive to keep film and TV production from fleeing to other countries. The industry has long sought a nationwide film incentive, which would supplement the state-by-state tax credit programs in places like Georgia, New Mexico, California and New York.
If Trump is to save Hollywood, as he suggests he’d like to do, he’ll need to align himself with the Democratic politicians he continues to insult. While these sort of reconciliations exits in films and on TV shows, they have not yet manifested in Trump’s current or prior administration.
References:
California lost $8 billion from runaway productions, report estimates
Forbes: How Hollywood Embraced Offshoring To Produce Its Biggest Blockbusters
