The last two places I’ve lived, Chiang Mai, Thailand, and Dubai, UAE, have both claimed to be “the next Hollywood.” They’ve created commissions, done feasibility studies, and given someone of importance at least a part-time job soliciting film and television production. The local newspapers have dutifully reported the initiatives, and quoted experts saying that it’s only a matter of time that this comes true. But it’s only been a matter of time for a lot of places to become the new Hollywood. There’s no physical reason why film and television production needs to be headquartered there. The sunshine that was important in 1915 for film production hasn’t been necessary for quite a while now. And any kid with a three hundred dollar camera and a laptop can now make a pretty good-looking movie. But mostly they don’t. Mostly they log onto facebook and scroll through what their friends are talking about. Or they play video games.

There are only a coupe of hundred thousand people who make a full-time living in Southern California’s entertainment industry. The decision makers probably only number less than ten thousand. But their is a tremendous value in the networks they have created over time, and the fact remains that those networks of people who own homes and drive cars and support families are more important than the hardware or the occasional pretty face.

So everything seems to change but nothing really changes. If you want to work in movies or television, you buy a one-way ticket on that Greyhound bus to Los Angeles and get off when the driver yells “Hollywood Boulevard!”