L.A. GOES COMMERCIAL : Influx of Production Firms, Advertisers Has Made the Area the Prime Location for Filming TV Spots

When Propaganda Films opened for business in Los Angeles two years ago, making TV commercials wasn’t even considered. The company filmed only music videos for such big-time singers as Steve Winwood and Sheena Easton.

This year, however, the bulk of Propaganda’s income won’t come from making music videos--but from filming TV commercials. “We realized we could no longer risk our business lives on a single format,” explained Bill Curran, executive producer at the Hollywood-based company.

It is companies such as Propaganda that are vastly changing the commercial production industry in Los Angeles. They are not only increasing competition in an already cutthroat business but also luring more and more advertisers to Los Angeles to film commercials.

As a result, the number of permits the city handed out last year to companies wanting to film ads reached the highest level in nearly a decade. The city issued 1,575 permits in 1988, according to the city’s Motion Picture Coordination Office. That is up 9.3% from 1987, and up more than 35% from 1984, when only 1,164 permits were issued. The permits involve only ads filmed outside production studios, but industry executives say production studios are doing record-breaking business as well.

“There seems to be a continuing move of production companies to the West Coast,” said Dirk Beving, director of the Motion Picture Coordination Office. “I don’t think it’s the weather. There are other factors, such as all the Japanese auto advertisers that are now located here.”

Indeed, more TV commercials are filmed in Los Angeles than anywhere else--even New York, said Dick Hall, past national president of the New York-based Assn. of Independent Producers. “The weather is one big factor,” he said, “but lower union wages also make it less expensive to film in Los Angeles.”

Star Directors

And it is the production companies that transform the ideas of advertisers and their agencies into the commercials you see on television. The process begins when an ad shop hires a production company to film a commercial for its clients. While the agency provides the script and the general concept, the production company hires set designers, lines up directors to oversee the actual filming and then puts together the final version of the commercials. Production companies make everything from $1-million ads for Pepsi to low-budget ads for local car dealers.

At the pricey end are some high-ticket directors that run their own production companies. Among them are Joe Pytka and Leslie Dektor, two directors that industry experts say are practically handed blank checks by major advertisers such as Pepsi and Levi Strauss & Co.

Some of their best-known commercials were filmed here in Los Angeles. The recent Pepsi ad that shows actor Michael J. Fox losing the keys to his car to a dog was filmed here. And so was Apple Computer’s spot with a teen-ager in a wheelchair rolling down the streets of Venice to the Randy Newman song “I’m Different.”

But most production companies handle less well-known ads. Some, in fact, would happily donate their time to film public service spots just to get their work seen on television. In all cases, these production companies try to make close contacts with local advertising agencies that hire them to film the commercials.

An estimated $2 billion is spent annually filming commercials nationwide. And nearly 30% of these commercials are made in California--most in the Los Angeles area, said Kathleen Milnes, deputy director of the California Film Commission, a state agency that promotes California as a film-making site. “It is one of the largest single pots of revenue in California,” she said.

Bi-Coastal Firm

Well aware of this potential bonanza, production companies of all sizes are opening offices Los Angeles at a rapid pace. Experts estimate that more than 100 are in business in the Los Angeles area. “There’s not a week that goes by that some new production company doesn’t open in Los Angeles,” said Ted Goetz, president of the West Coast chapter of the Assn. of Independent Commercial Producers. “And each one of them makes it sound like it’s the Second Coming.”

Production companies with New York roots also have recently begun to enter the Los Angeles market. In early January, for example, Luckafilm Inc., a 5-year-old New York production company, opened a Los Angeles office. “In order to get business, it’s now necessary to be a bi-coastal company,” said Claus Lucka, owner of the company and director of a number of ads for Honda and Chrysler. “Besides,” Lucka added, “nearly 60% of my work is produced in Los Angeles.”

Six years ago, Dole Productions Inc. moved from Chicago to Marina Del Rey. The company, which specializes in special effects productions, has filmed commercials for firms ranging from Mattel to Bridgestone. Its recent Bridgestone commercial features a man who looks like he’s driving down the street without a car under him. “I guess we do weird commercials,” said Kevin Dole, who owns the firm. “And Los Angeles is the place to do it.”

But Tony Petrucelli had more personal reasons when he moved his 25-year-old production company, Petrucelli Associates, from New York to Irvine in January. “This was really more a choice of where I wanted to live than where I wanted to work,” said Petrucelli, whose clients have included Volkswagen and Kentucky Fried Chicken. “New York is a very stressful place. And that stress doesn’t allow people to do the work that they are capable of doing.”

Need Firefighters

To the delight of local merchants, commercials filmed here often draw out-of-town producers, directors and key officials from firms paying for the ads. “These aren’t the kind of people who travel coach,” Goetz said. “And you can bet they don’t stay at Motel 6s.” In fact, he said, the typical executive who comes here from out of town to work on a commercial spends more than $300 a day.

The commercial production business can also keep the Los Angeles Fire Department busy. Many commercials filmed off studio lots here require firefighters on the set to make certain there are no fire hazards.

The city, of course, is constantly trying to woo both movie makers and the makers of commercials. As a result, it is happy to make available most of the city’s property. That includes Mayor Bradley’s private office in City Hall. “We don’t get a lot of requests for that,” Beving said. “But it can be made available.”

What’s the most commonly requested city location for filming ads? It’s Griffith Park, hands down, Beving said. No. 2 is City Hall. And tied for third are some of the residential streets in Hancock Park, Brentwood and Pacific Palisades.

Sometimes, however, too many commercials filmed at some locations can raise the wrath of residents or merchants. In fact, several years ago, merchants in the picturesque central business area of Pacific Palisades tried to limit commercial productions there. Many felt that the constant barrage of film crews was keeping customers from shopping at their stores.

“But some advertisers will go to any length to get a location,” Beving said. One advertiser was so eager to film an ad in the Pacific Palisades town square that it made a deal the merchants couldn’t refuse. “They hired a valet parking company while they were filming,” Beving said, “and they valet parked all the customers’ cars.”