LA Sees Another Dull Production Quarter as It Waits for Tax Incentive Impacts

 We’ve seen another glum quarter for shoot days in LA, but with the bulk of the projects that benefited from the expanded and refreshed tax credit program only set to show in the next quarter, there’s still a lot to hope for. Brandon Blake, entertainment attorney at Blake & Wang P.A., walks us through it all.

                                                                        Brandon Blake


Shoot Days Down for Q2


Compared with the same quarter in 2025, shoot days were down 12.7%. However, let’s not lose sight of the fact that the expansion to California’s tax credit incentive program will only really show in the next quarter, before anyone gets too gloomy. Of the 170 projects that have been granted credits under the new plan, most will only show their impact from Q3. 41 new feature films have been granted credits just this month, with two potential high-earners from Disney among them. 


However, this does represent 35.9% below the 5-year average, with just 4,711 shoot days, and it is also a small drop from Q1’s 5,121 shoot days.


                                                               Blake & Wang Law Firm 

 

Perspective from the Ground


Despite the disappointing news, local incentivized productions are on the rise, and the City Mayor is, reportedly, still fighting to move the current $750M cap to a completely uncapped tax credit that would include both reality TV productions and above-the-line spending.

 

While the drop from Q1 is understandably disappointing, it’s important to realize that Q1 itself saw something of a mini-boom. Q2, on the other hand, was mostly defined by indie production. TV dramas actually saw a 55.1% increase compared with Q1, which is always positive. 


Most of the drops were seen across TV comedies, which do tend to favor the soundstages that are not counted as on-location shoots, and reality TV, which has been on a multi-year downward slump. Commercial production also took a dip, while the nebulous “other” category saw a small uptick.


Overall, while we all would have liked to see a positive report, it’s still too early to doom LA production off the back of one slow quarter. Let’s hope to be reporting far better results in the next 3 months.


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