FilmLA has issued its sixth Sound Stage Study, updating its ongoing survey of Los Angeles area studio developments, and releasing new stage occupancy and use data for calendar year 2022.
FilmLA’s report is made possible by a unique data-sharing partnership with 17 participating studio operators, who by entrusting FilmLA with sensitive business information, help bring the local production picture into clearer focus. Participating studios, which include the six major Hollywood studios and the region’s largest independent operators together control 35 facilities and 83 percent of the estimated 6.5 million square feet of certified sound stage space available in Greater Los Angeles.
Since FilmLA’s last sound stage update in March of 2023, both the U.K. and Georgia have added more than one million square feet of stage inventory to their existing supply. Now comparable to Los Angeles, the U.K. currently has around 6.6 million square feet of stage space, with plans to add dozens of new facilities. Georgia currently has over 4 million square feet of studio space and several significant projects in various planning and expansion phases.
“Just like with trained crew, the availability of purpose-built sound stages is a factor that helps determine the attractiveness of any filming location,” observed FilmLA president Paul Audley. “Our study shows that many jurisdictions are expanding their stage infrastructure and competing harder for the business we also want to win for L.A.”
On a local level, FilmLA is tracking 18 new studio projects totaling roughly 3.5 million square feet of space in various stages of planning and development in Los Angeles.
According to FilmLA’s research participants, recent studio occupancy and utilization in Los Angeles and elsewhere have decreased, as was expected. As new supporting data reveals, as fears of industry strikes began to permeate the industry in the latter part of 2022, Q4 stage occupancy fell below seasonal norms. Overall, L.A. area stage operators reported an average annual occupancy of 90 percent in 2022, down 3 percent from the prior year. Future FilmLA reports will show the full effect of industry disruption on L.A. area sound stage occupancy.
In terms of utilization, a total of 1,354 projects were filmed in 35 facilities owned by the 17 studio participants in 2022. These 1,354 projects generated a total of 10,356 stage shoot days, with episodic television series accounting for the largest segment of production–approximately 30 percent of all projects and two-thirds of all stage shoot days.
With the number of series episodes ordered per season declining across all segments of television (streaming, broadcast and cable), the number of shoot days that series generated declined by 36.4 percent between 2018 and 2022 from 10,582 to 6,901. In 2022, series shoot days accounted for 66 percent of all production activity, compared to approximately 73 percent in 2018.
Santa Clarita Studios, having joined as a research program participant last year, is the latest studio to have its data included in FilmLA’s sound stage study.
ESPN and other channels return to DirecTV with a new Disney deal after a nearly 2-week blackout
DirecTV announced Saturday it had reached a deal with Walt Disney Co. that will restore ESPN and ABC-owned stations to its service after a nearly 2-week dispute that blacked out those networks for millions of viewers across the U.S.
The end of the impasse came in time for sports fans to watch ESPN's slate of college football games on DirecTV. It also will ensure that ABC's telecast of the Emmy Awards on Sunday night will be available in more major markets where viewers subscribe to DirecTV's pay service.
ABC had been unavailable since Sept. 1 on DirecTV in several markets where the station is owned by Disney. Those were located in the San Francisco Bay Area; Fresno, California; New York; Chicago; Philadelphia; Houston; and Raleigh, North Carolina.
DirecTV's 11 million subscribers abruptly lost access to ESPN, the ABC-owned stations and other Disney-owned channels such as FX and National Geographic during the Labor Day weekend in a dispute over carriage fees and programming flexibility.
Some viewers were watching the fourth round of the U.S. Open tennis tournament when ESPN suddenly went dark and others were getting ready to watch a college football showdown between LSU and Southern California.
The impasse also kept the NFL's opening game of Monday Night Football off of DirecTV's service.
Financial details of Disney's new deal with DirecTV weren't disclosed as part of Saturday's announcement. DirecTV's payments to Disney will be based on "market-based" pricing, according to the announcement about the deal.
The agreement also will give DirecTV the ability to offer Disney's video streaming services a la carte as well as in its own bundled packages. DirecTV won the right to include ESPN's forthcoming direct-to-consumer... Read More