HOLLYWOOD’S RUNAWAYS

If Hollywood made a movie about the current state of film making, it might have to be a remake of “Exodus.”

This time, the exodus would be of TV and film productions away from California and toward other U.S. states and Canada.

Runaway production siphons about $600 million a year from California, according to the state Department of Commerce’s film office. That’s worth nearly $2 billion to the state economy, when you consider the multiplier effect from wage earners re-spending that money.

Production monies are funneled out by such diverse projects as “Police Academy 4,” which was shot in Toronto to save money, to ABC’s “Spenser: For Hire” series, which films in Boston, and like NBC’s “Miami Vice,” attempts to capitalize on a fresh new setting.

“This community is going through a metamorphosis,” said UA Films Chairman Anthony Thomopoulos, who likened Hollywood’s loss of film business to Detroit’s slump in car making. “It has been supported and has made its name and brought in tourism and done so much for the state because it has been in the motion picture business.

“Right now that (business) is all starting to leave.”

Of the 175 feature films shot last year in the United States, the state film office notes, only 74 were shot entirely in California. Half of all made-for-TV movies, too, are being shot outside the state.

When the runaway movie-making trend trickles down to weekly TV series, the impact is massive because of the sheer number of episodes churned out.

A dozen prime-time network series are produced or about to be produced elsewhere: NBC’s “Miami Vice” (Miami), “The Cosby Show” (Brooklyn), “Crime Story” (Chicago) and “Stingray” (Canada); CBS’ “Houston Knights” (Houston), “Magnum, P.I.” (Hawaii), “The Equalizer” and “Kate & Allie” (New York); ABC’s “Spenser: for Hire” (Boston), “Jack & Mike” (Chicago) and “Mariah State” (Canada) and Fox Broadcasting Co.’s “Jump Street Chapel” (Canada).

Many of those seek a change of venue away from palm trees, Van Nuys Boulevard and the Santa Monica Pier.

But others are desperate to cut costs--as are many of the theatrical films, TV-movies and syndicated and cable shows relocating around North America.

How does leaving Hollywood help?

“It’s a touchy question,” said Walt Disney Co. spokesman Erwin Okun, in explaining why Disney Chairman Michael Eisner declined to be interviewed about runaway production. Many other show-business executives insisted on speaking anonymously about the causes of the problem.

They’re tight-lipped because they invariably point a finger at Hollywood’s unions, especially the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, the 65,000-member organization that staffs most film and TV crews.

(The Hollywood union, in turn, points a finger back at producers, accusing them of poor planning and unnecessary overstaffing.)

Every producer interviewed about shooting in Canada, for example, mentioned the cooperative attitude of Canadian unions--including the branches of IATSE--as a major reason for relocating there, right after the beneficial exchange rate.

“They’re still running, they don’t walk,” producer-director Norman Jewison said, contrasting his Canadian crew members with Hollywood’s.

Michael Filerman, who developed the TV series “Dallas,” “Knots Landing” and “Falcon Crest,” shot part of his “Christmas Eve” TV movie for NBC in a Toronto courtroom that was only available on Saturdays. In Hollywood, Saturday shooting means costly overtime, but in Toronto IATSE crews willingly work a Wednesday-through-Sunday schedule at no extra charge.

In Hollywood, a sound crew requires three people; in Toronto, only two, noted producer Don Carmody, working on the Matt Dillon film “The Arm.” “We’re asking for waivers of meal penalties about every second day,” he added, referring to situations where completion of a scene runs into the union-specified meal time. “In L.A., you don’t even ask.”

Comparisons like that are replayed every day in the United States, where virtually every state now operates its own film liaison office and touts its advantages over Hollywood. Among those are 21 right-to-work states, where the unions can be sidestepped entirely.

IATSE officials, however, present a different case.

Overstaffed crews? Overtime penalties?

“That’s because they don’t understand how to make movies, and I’m being quite sincere,” said Mac St. Johns, L.A.-based spokesman and international representative for IATSE. “We have no objections to doing favors for the producers to help them save money. What we do object to is when they’ve made some idiotic errors of their own and they want us to take the blame for it.”

St. Johns notes that the so-called “below-the-line” portion of a movie budget--the physical making of the film--accounts for only 30% to 35% of the total cost. The rest is “above-the-line”: acquiring a book or screenplay, fees for actors, directors and producers and studio overhead.

Why, St. John wants to know, don’t producers cut their stars’ salaries--and their own--to keep costs down?

“You know what the answer to that is?” asked producer Stephen J. Cannell, when that question was directed to him. “An actor is a creative element. A writer, producer and director are creative elements without which you can’t make the show. A driver isn’t. A craft service person isn’t.

“If I want Dustin Hoffman, I gotta pay his price. It’s an open market. If he overprices himself, then he doesn’t work.”

Cannell, who recently completed a pilot for NBC in San Antonio and has two series based in Vancouver, insists that “I’m not anti-labor. I’m just looking at a business here (in Hollywood) that doesn’t work anymore.”

Producers readily acknowledge that the unions are not the only problem.

The many jurisdictions in the L.A. area create their own bureaucratic maze. Each city has its own police and fire regulations. Some, such as Glendale, have become resistant to filming within their borders.

It could take a computer whiz to work out the permit paperwork to film, say, a moving car on Washington Boulevard. Within four miles the production would cross from Venice (City of Los Angeles) to Marina del Rey (L.A. County) to Los Angeles to Culver City and back to Los Angeles. “When you want to cross jurisdictional lines, that’s where the big problem arises,” explained Carol Akiyama, senior vice president of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

Producers also speak of the “hip” factor in Los Angeles. As Carmody tells it, “Some guy’s standing there on a sidewalk, and you say, ‘Sir, please move,’ and he says, ‘$200 and I’ll move.’ ”

Finding solutions is not as easy as placing blame.

But Hollywood--the unions, the studios, the bureaucracies--is starting to take hard look at ways to stem the flow of production to other states.

IATSE and the producers’ alliance representing the major studios begin negotiations after Jan. 1 on separate contracts for low-budget and medium-budget films that would allow producers to hire smaller crews. St. Johns gave very tentative figures of $5 million as the cutoff on what would be considered a low-budget film and up to $12 million for a medium budget.

(The primary purpose of that move, St. Johns acknowledged, is to replace non-union workers on small films. Nonetheless, it would, in theory, allow the studios to make smaller films for less money.)

The union also is considering lowering producers’ payments toward union members’ pensions and reducing certain penalty payments.

The producers alliance, meanwhile, is seeking to streamline the permit process by getting more cities to adopt “one-stop” offices for all required permits. Los Angeles and unincorporated sections of L.A. County currently offer that time-saving approach.

Some opponents of runaway production believe that producers don’t always take full advantage of existing rules.

Lindsley Parsons Jr., chief production manager at MGM/UA, said that he used a greensman and special-effects man as grips to move some scenery on the film “Poltergeist II.” They did so--and were quite cooperative, he said--because the union allows for a certain interchangeability if the minimum number of grips already have been hired.

“One of the solutions is education,” said Parsons, who recently became chairman of the California Motion Picture Council, a state advisory commission linked to the state film office.

TV producer Aaron Spelling said that he recently had a production still shooting as midnight Friday approached--and with it, a whole new day’s pay. The crew, when asked, rushed to finish the scene in time.

“I am basically a union man,” he said. “I don’t agree with others who say that union crews are lazy or don’t work hard enough.” Spelling wants to keep his productions in California “unless absolutely forced” to move.

Many of Hollywood’s TV- and movie-makers, if they had their druthers, would stay put.

When CBS’ “Kay O’Brien” was shooting in Toronto, director Michael Caffey lamented the difficulty in clearing up script problems with writers headquartered in Century City. “They’re going to finish (writing) the second act late this afternoon. Well, that’s 9 p.m. our time. We won’t be here. When we have questions at 9 a.m., it’s only 7 a.m. there. Who’s going to answer a question at 7 a.m.?”

Cannell, too, believes his out-of-town shows suffer from a lack of communication. Signals can get crossed between L.A.-based producers, let’s say, during casting and an episode’s director 1,000 miles away. The result is “a bozo performance--and it’s nobody’s fault.”

“I want to shoot here,” Cannell said. “I live here. I like the support services. I like the guilds. I just can’t afford it.”

St. Johns acknowledges that it’s in the best interest of his union to keep producers like Cannell in town. “We know we’ve got to do something and we’re willing to do it,” St. Johns said.

“A lot of tourists come to Los Angeles because of Hollywood,” Spelling noted. “They want to see pictures being shot, they want to see studios and they want to see movie stars. If we don’t stop this slide, I think so much production can leave this city that a lot of the glamour is going to go with it.”