Insiders say recent fee hikes by FilmL.A. add to a long list of motives for productions to film in other areas: “Unless there’s some specific reason to be in Los Angeles, we don’t shoot there anymore.”
On July 1, two months into the writers strike, FilmL.A. rolled out rate hikes on a slew of fees to obtain permits to shoot in the region. Some of the increases, like with application fees and authorization to shoot at certain locations, were tied to inflation. Others — for rider, photo and notification fees — represented markups of roughly 8 to 17 percent. The agency also introduced a host of entirely new administrative fees for complex filming requests, including for drone, helicopter and special effects use, lane and street closures, and simulated gunfire.
