Film Workers Urge Legislation to Keep Production Here

After two decades of steady work as a makeup artist for the film industry, most recently on the television series “JAG,” Dorinda Carey of Burbank hasn’t had any work since January.

George Nadian of Woodland Hills has been a Teamsters driver on action films including “Eraser” and “From Dusk Till Dawn,” but his work has decreased by 50% in the last year.

Roger Lattin, a Mission Hills lighting technician who has worked on the television series “Frasier,” has had to turn down surplus job offers in past years, but he is not sure what he’s going to do after his present job finishes up this month.

Carey, Nadian and Lattin are all certain of the reason for a dearth of local film jobs: runaway production.

Film and television companies are increasingly going to Canada, Mexico and Australia because of lower production costs and, in the case of Canada, government subsidy programs.

“I’ve been in the business for 23 years and this has been a nightmare for the last year,” Carey said. “All the work has moved out. There is no work. There aren’t even places to interview.”

On Sunday, Carey, Nadian and Lattin joined more than 1,500 boom operators, editors, gaffers, grips, directors and actors at a rally in Burbank to call for the state to intervene to keep film and television production in California.

The “Bring Hollywood Home” rally was hosted at Johnny Carson Park by the new Film and Television Action Committee to protest the exodus of jobs to other countries and demand help in stemming the flood of production out of the state.

In particular, the film and television workers are supporting pending state legislation that would provide tax credits to companies that employ people on productions in California.

“Today we are gathered to really do no less than launch a movement to preserve the way of life we have here,” Assemblyman Scott Wildman (D-Los Angeles) said. “To protect our jobs, we need to bring Hollywood home.”

Wildman has written a bill that would provide a 10% tax credit on labor costs for in-state productions. Assemblywoman Sheila Kuehl (D-Santa Monica) has proposed similar legislation.

The bills are scheduled to be heard this afternoon by the Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee.

Assemblyman Wally Knox (D-Los Angeles), the committee’s chairman, drew cheers from the large crowd when he said he would recommend that the bills be approved.

Knox added, however, that it is important for the film industry workers to telephone and fax legislators in support of the bills.

Representatives of Gov. Gray Davis, Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante and U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein also voiced general support for efforts to keep film jobs in California.

The film industry workers who attended the rally signed petitions and videotaped testimonials in support of the tax incentive bills.

“I feel it’s important to level the playing field and keep this great group of people contributing to one of the main things that makes Southern California such a great place to be,” said David Long, a prop maker who lives in Sunland.

Addressing the large crowd in the baking afternoon sun, Jack DeGovia, the chairman of the Film and Television Action Committee, said runaway production is “tearing our industry apart.”

DeGovia said the result is that support businesses are failing, craft workers are losing their homes and the local economy is threatened.

In the crowd, there were dozens of stories of hardship.

Nadian has had to drive trucks outside the film industry and do landscaping to make ends meet.

“It’s been really poor for us this year,” he said of the 5,000 drivers in his union. “If I didn’t work outside the business I wouldn’t be able to pay the bills.”

Carey has had to dip into her savings to keep afloat until the next job comes along. At the rally, she stood next to sound-boom operator Tim Song Jones, who carried a sign that read “Will Boom For Food.”

Actors Esai Morales and Seymour Cassel attended the rally to show support for the craft workers.

The Screen Actors Guild estimated that 11,251 U.S. jobs will be lost during the 1998-99 television season because of foreign production of TV movies, mostly in Canada, where a weak dollar and tax subsidies make it less costly to shoot films.

Film director Jeremy Kagan cited a study that found $3 billion in productions have fled California for Canada in the last few years.

The Directors Guild of America has hired a lobbyist to push for federal legislation that would encourage productions to stay in the United States.

“I have a lot of Canadian friends. They are employed and they are happy,” Kagan said. “I have more American friends. They are not employed or happy. It’s not fair and it’s not right.”

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’ I ‘ve been in the business for 23 years and this has been a nightmare for the last year. . . . There is no work. There aren’t even places to interview.’

DORINDA CAREY

Makeup artist