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Film, TV Production in Ontario to Continue Amid Pandemic Surge (hollywoodreporter.com)

Cameras rolling locally on Netflix’s ‘Locke & Key’ and Apple TV+’s ‘See’ is still permitted as the province declares a state of emergency.

Ontario has decided to leave Hollywood film and TV shoots on local soundstages untouched as the province declares a state of emergency amid a resurgent coronavirus outbreak.

“As further lockdown measures were announced by Premier (Doug) Ford today on January 12, film and television productions and post-production projects will continue to operate with no changes to the previously reported guidelines presented in the province-wide shutdown currently taking place,” the Toronto Film Office said in a statement obtained by The Hollywood Reporter.

By: Etan Viessing

Continue Reading at hollywoodreporter.com

Los Angeles Film and TV Permits Plunged in December as COVID Surged (variety.com)

Film permit applications in the city and county of Los Angeles declined steeply in December, dropping 24.9 percent from November levels to 613 permits. FilmLA reported Tuesday.

This is the second straight month that FilmLA has seen permit requests drop, as production levels that picked up after the pandemic shutdown began to drop again. In November, monthly activity slipped 7.6 percent from October levels to 813 permits.

FilmLA spokesman Philip Sokoloski explained, “When production was allowed to restart last June, the majority of work that powers the greater Los Angeles economy didn’t start up right away. It wasn’t until September that we started to see some of the scripted television production work and feature work resuming.”

By Jazz Tangcay

Continue Reading at variety.com

Los Angeles Film Permits Drop Nearly 25% in December as COVID-19 Cases Surge (thewrap.com)

Over the past month, Los Angeles has become America’s epicenter of the COVID-19 crisis; and even though film and TV productions in Hollywood have not been forced to shut down, the infection surge has taken its toll.

According to FilmLA, film permit requests in December fell 24.9% from November with 613 permit requests received. That’s an average of 29 permits per day, the lowest FilmLA has seen since August. While many businesses in L.A. County have been forced to close due to the pandemic, filming has been allowed to move forward as productions are subject to extensive government regulations and mandated COVID-19 safety requirements created last summer by Hollywood’s labor unions.

By: Jeremy Fuster

Continue Reading at thewrap.com

California Is Ready to Resume Film Production. But Is Hollywood? (variety.com)

Film and television production may be able to resume in California on June 12, but major studios are still weeks — if not months — away from rolling cameras.

Before shooting can start or resume on movies and TV shows, the various labor unions that represent everyone from the grips to the actors to the directors, have to sign off on safety procedures for how sets should operate in the age of coronavirus. Nearly 200 people from across the entertainment industry were involved in drafting a white paper outlining new safety protocols that range from increasing testing and temperature tests to quarantining casts and crews. Insiders predict that the final sign-off on those plans is between four to six weeks away.

“For the major film productions and a handful of premium TV shows, this pandemic was like tranquilizing an elephant,” said one top film studio executive, speaking on the condition of anonymity. “We’re not going to be able to stand up right away.”

By Brent Lang, Matt Donnelly

Continue Reading on Variety.com

 

Unemployment Rate Falls to 13.3% as States Reopen During Coronavirus (variety.com)

 

The economy gained 2.5 million jobs in May, while the unemployment rate dropped to 13.3%, according to the Labor Department.

The slight improvement in an otherwise bleak economic picture was due to the reopening of businesses in several states. Unemployment levels leapt to 14.7% in April, as the coronavirus pandemic ground American life to a standstill. That number and the May results surpassed the worst figure of the Great Recession, when unemployment topped out at 10% in 2009. Many of the gains came in the leisure and hospitality sector, where reopened restaurants saw job levels increase by 1.2 million, following losses of 7.5 million in April and 743,000 in March.

The number of unemployed persons fell by 2.1 million to 21 million. In May, the number of unemployed persons who were jobless less than five weeks decreased by 10.4 million to 3.9 million. These individuals made up 18.5 percent of the unemployed, while the number of unemployed persons who have been without work for five to 14 weeks rose by 7.8 million to 14.8 million.

By Brent Lang

Continue Reading at variety.com