The wildfires rage on as widespread delays affect the Academy Awards and active productions in Los Angeles. Graphic by Elizabeth Hein.
ALEX MCCARTY | STAFF REPORTER | armccarty@butler.edu
The devastating wildfires in Los Angeles have brought Hollywood and the 2025 awards season to a standstill. For the past two weeks, hundreds of thousands of lives have been turned upside down. Many homes and iconic buildings have been destroyed, displacing people who stretch from the biggest of movie stars to the most modest of crew members. Many awards shows have been postponed and Hollywood activity in the area has ceased production in the wake of this tragedy.
The Oscars nomination announcement has been delayed twice and will now occur on Jan. 23. Four governors on the board have lost their homes. Dawn Hudson, the former CEO of The Academy for Motion Picture Arts, was among those affected. The ceremony is still on track for its original date of March 2, 2025.
First-year psychology major Sarah Lugo, a resident of Los Angeles, gave her thoughts on how the fires could impact the attendees of The Oscars.
“I think the fact that it is two months out is ok, but it should definitely depend on how the goers and movie stars feel and how they’ve been affected by it,” Lugo said. “I don’t think it would be smart to push all these people into a room and pretend like everything is still ok.”
Awards shows aren’t the only sector of Hollywood affected. The film industry, which had already been damaged by the COVID-19 pandemic and the 2023 writer strikes, has suffered another blow. Several premieres for films in the Los Angeles area have been postponed, including the films “Better Man” and “Wolf Man”.
The fire has also displaced countless people in the industry. A-list stars such as Mandy Moore and Billy Crystal have lost their homes to the ravaging fires, while the late David Lynch recently passed away after evacuating his home in Los Angeles. There are also thousands of production crew members who are struggling to find work while the fires rage on.
Eli Kohn, a junior creative media and entertainment major, reflected on the destruction the fire had wrought and contrasted it to what Los Angeles was like when he went there to study away.
“I was just there this summer and everything was completely fine,” Kohn said. “It was beautiful [and] serene. I was there six months ago and it’s hard to believe that in such a short time span, so much of that area is gone.”
Many television productions in the Los Angeles area have been delayed by the fires. “Suits: LA”, a spinoff of the popular show, paused production on later episodes of its first season on Jan. 8. Production on other shows such as Amazon’s “Fallout” and ABC’s “Grey’s Anatomy” was also delayed. Setbacks such as these are significant in the current era of streaming television, as these services require consistent content releases to satisfy their users.
The physical destruction of Hollywood coincides with the rise of streaming services over movie theaters and physical media. More and more films lack a theatrical release with proper marketing, which has led to countless box office flops. Studios nowadays would rather toss their movies on a monthly subscription service than take a risk. With the wildfires delivering yet another financial blow to the already-struggling film industry, it is unclear whether the traditional values of Hollywood will survive.
Several of Hollywood’s most iconic landmarks have been threatened, including the Dolby Theatre where the Oscars are annually held. The wildfires were contained in the Hollywood Hills where the theatre is, along with several other important places like the TCL Chinese Theater and the Hollywood Shopping Center. Unfortunately, many other important buildings have been destroyed. This includes the Palisades Charter High School, which was a set for films such as “Carrie” and “Freaky Friday”.
One point of contention that the wildfires have surfaced is the position of Los Angeles as a film production hub. In recent years, cities such as Atlanta and Albuquerque have sprung up as promising centers for film and television production. These cities offer generous tax incentives that reduce the cost of production while also being cheaper to live in than Hollywood.
Simultaneously, the price of living in Los Angeles has only increased while the amount of local production has fallen. The wildfires will continue to contribute to these losses. This could lead to a mass migration of film and television crew from LA to other cities, which would damage the reputation of Hollywood as the iconic movie hub it has been for many years.
Mei-Lin Walters, a senior critical communication media studies major, touched on the migration of talent from Los Angeles to other cities and how it could affect the notoriety of Hollywood.
“I feel like the media industry is expanding outward from LA,” Walters said. “With these fires and everything being destroyed, it is very devastating. [Earning] all of the money that it takes to rebuild also takes time and what the media industry doesn’t have is time.”
Progress is being made to put a stop to the wildfires, but there is still a long way to go. It will be some time before Hollywood will recover from this disaster, as countless people in the film and television industries will need to rebuild their homes as well as their lives.
Thankfully, there has been an outpouring of support from across the country and a unification of those living in the LA area. The Academy donated $250,000 from a canceled Oscars luncheon event to aid fire relief efforts, while actors such as Jamie Lee Curtis and Leonardo Dicaprio have donated up to $1 million to wildlife relief. The future of Hollywood may be uncertain, but the people who forge it will not let it die.
Ways to support or donate to those affected by the LA fires can be found at the LAHSA website.