Opinion: They’re back

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Something that had been not-quite-missing from my daily routine these past few months was the very mixed blessing of being able to rubberneck movie and TV productions. The Soloist did film on our third floor during the strike, and the cast and crew, in sharp distinction to the tradition of movie-production jackholery, were notably polite and patient, with the Steve Lopez-portraying Robert Downey Jr. personable and sober as a judge at 8:30 in the morning. On the other hand, a Tom Arnold comedy which included a prop van topped with a giant-ant simulacrum (‘See, you can tell it’s a comedy,’ one P.A. told me, pointing at the van) was filming late at night in the no-man’s-land around the corner from me a few weeks back, and while walking one of my kids to sleep I got a snippy attitude from somebody who was at least acting like a director. (I like to think it was The Skeptic helmer ‘Tennyson Bardwell,’ because if you’re going to get rudeness you might as well get it from somebody with a cool-sounding name, but the plot synopsis doesn’t sound like what I saw shooting.)

Now that the productions are back in earnest, I am again haunted by an economic question: How can an industry with such a dubious future still support such largesse? Shark was filming outside the L.A. Times building a few days back: Seven trailers, ten or so tents, two 18-wheelers, several more six-wheelers, assorted pickup trucks and other vehicles, the usual mountains of food... Now I like pretty much anything with James Woods, who came as close as any American to preventing the 9/11 attacks, but does a second-ten-rated series really generate that kind of economy anymore?