LOS ANGELES — Cue up Randy Newman: POLITICO is making its Los Angeles debut.
Angelenos aren’t exactly saying “we love it!” often these days. The city’s signature industry is ailing, recovery from last year’s wildfires is lagging and the former reality star of “The Hills” has turned the mayoral race into a national spectacle as he runs on a platform that Los Angeles has been overcome by zombie-like drug addicts.
In short, Los Angeles is facing some tough questions about its identity — and POLITICO will be tackling some of the biggest ones this afternoon.
First up, Melanie will be interviewing Mayor Karen Bass, who was once the most popular elected official in the region. But ever since the devastating wildfires, she’s struggled to regain her footing. And now, as she asks voters for “time to finish my job,” as she told MS NOW over the weekend, she’s fending off incoming from her one-time ally, Council member Nithya Raman, and Spencer Pratt, the aforementioned reality supervillain of the mid-aughts.
Pratt is certainly surfing a wave of attention, powered by promises to crack down on homelessness (without detailing how he’d do so) and viral Batman and Star Wars-themed AI videos created by fans.
The novelty act may eventually wear thin in deep-blue LA, but it is tapping into the existential angst throughout the city right now — a mood that presents a tricky balancing act as she runs for reelection.
Next up, a panel on LA’s fire recovery with County Supervisor Kathryn Barger, whose district includes fire-ravaged Altadena, and Miguel Santana, president and CEO of the California Community Foundation. The discussion will be moderated by our own Liam Dillon, who has been all over the rebuild effort, including his analysis last month that officials’ promises for a “faster than ever” recovery don’t square with local permitting data.
And Daniel Miller, our team’s newest member, will be taking stock of the current state of show biz — including production incentives, AI anxiety and entertainment business politics — with the MPAA’s Kathy Bañuelos and Adam Conover, a writer, actor and board member of the Writers Guild of America West.
Speaking of Hollywood… Daniel and Jeremy B. White write today about a notable attitude shift among industry donors. Long a force in presidential politics — most recently through its opposition to Donald Trump — the industry is entering the midterms with a more urgent, self-interested agenda, driven less by celebrities and national or international causes than by workers and executives alarmed that California could lose its signature business.
Anxiety about the exodus of production to other states and countries is part of a broader upheaval clouding the entertainment ecosystem, with media consolidation and the disruptive force of artificial intelligence among the other pressures galvanizing the industry. And that is giving it a new kind of leverage in the governor’s race, the Los Angeles mayor’s contest and other down-ballot campaigns — and forcing candidates to answer a question many once could avoid: What, exactly, will they do to save Hollywood?
“It’s 100 percent true that the rank-and-file, and the people that are either donating or are trying to rally their industry colleagues to donate, are much more focused on local and state politics than they have been on national issues in a long time,” said Alex Franklin, a talent manager at Zero Gravity Management representing cinematographers and production designers. “There are more questions like, ‘Hey, who is best for Hollywood?’”
This first appeared in California Playbook.
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