"Fallout": producer praises tax incentive that took series to Hollywood
As guests milled around a huge studio that houses one of the sets for the Amazon Prime Video series "Fallout," executive producer Jonathan Nolan highlighted the role of tax incentives in the decision to bring production to California.
The first season of the series, a big-budget adaptation of a video game set in a world devastated by nuclear war, was filmed in New York. California managed to attract production to the West Coast in the second season, offering US$25 million (around R$130 million) in tax incentives.
"If the tax credit didn't exist, we wouldn't even consider the possibility and we wouldn't be able to be here," said Nolan, sitting in a folding chair positioned against the backdrop of a "Vault", an underground anti-nuclear shelter decorated with the series' retro-futuristic aesthetic.
Nolan played a leading role in the campaign for California to approve US$750 million (about R$3.9 billion) in tax incentives designed to attract more film and television productions to the state. He even invited state parliamentarians to visit the studios last year, with the aim of showing how actors and professionals in the field would benefit from the incentives.
"Fallout" stayed in California for its third season thanks to $42 million in tax credits on a $166.3 million budget, which allowed the production to hire nearly 600 crew members and 30 actors, according to the California Film Commission.
Nolan said he and other industry professionals had become accustomed to boarding planes to film in London, Budapest or Sydney, without worrying about the impact it might have on Hollywood.
"People kind of laughed at the idea that Hollywood would ever stop being Hollywood - but I think in the last five years that's really happened," Nolan said.
Employment in the entertainment industry has been falling since peaking in late 2022, reducing opportunities for actors, screenwriters and the countless professionals - from carpenters to costume designers, camera operators and catering teams - who support film and television productions.
California has been especially hard hit, losing 17,234 jobs between 2019 and 2023, according to the Milken Institute. The study concluded that a combination of factors, including falling television advertising revenue and stagnant streaming growth, led studios to look for cheaper locations to produce films and series.
The occupancy rate at Hollywood studios fell to 62% in the first half of 2025, compared to levels close to full occupancy in 2016, according to FilmLA, a non-profit organization responsible for coordinating filming in the greater Los Angeles region.
"This threatens to hollow out and destroy a century-old cultural institution that is perhaps one of the most important parts of American culture and our ability to spread that culture around the world," Nolan said. "So I believe that tax incentives were essential to bring us back."
Actor Walton Goggins, who plays the characters Cooper Howard - an antebellum Hollywood star known for starring in Westerns - and the bounty hunter known as The Ghoul, told Reuters he is grateful for the opportunity to work in Los Angeles.
"This work permeates every aspect of this city. So to be back here filming a series that employs so many people - artisans who are among the best in the world at what they do, having the opportunity to perform at the highest level - leaves me in awe," said Goggins, adding: "I just hope this tax incentive is expanded so that more productions can come back here."
See the 1st scene from "Fallout", a game-based Prime Video series
Source: CNN