CMU School of Drama


Thursday, November 02, 2023

As the 'Hollywood of the South,' Atlanta has boomed. Its actors and crew are now at a crossroads

AP News: For more than a decade, work had been nonstop in Atlanta’s booming film industry thanks to Georgia’s extremely generous tax break. Dubbed the “Hollywood of the South,” metro Atlanta became a ubiquitous backdrop for huge projects, including Marvel films and Netflix’s “Stranger Things.”

2 comments:

Selina Wang said...

The article left me with thoughts here and there. Firstly, I think it’s incredible how Ed was able to make it to set lighting despite not coming from this background. It once again reminds me that this industry welcomes anyone who is willing to network and learn. But this somewhat makes me wonder if people with no experience are getting hired, then would I have ended up at my dream job whether I have this degree or not? Part of me knows that this is all worth something, but sometimes I can’t help but wonder if this degree is as necessary as it seems. Secondly, I feel like it must be hard to support the strike and the union when one isn’t even employed anymore. I wonder if, deep down, anyone ‘blames’ the strike for ‘taking away’ their job. This may be harsh to say, but I feel like it’s hard to not be selfish when one can barely make a living.

Esther said...

This was such an interesting article to read about the different perspectives of the strikes and how it is affecting people around the country. I have heard that Atlanta has been used as a location of filming and it was honestly not a big surprise since the location and the amount of people that have moved there for it. I think that reading about all of the different people that are being hurt by the strike is honestly heart breaking. They even talk about how they know that the strike is for a good reason and they hope for a good result but they just want to go back to work so desperately. The article showcases that people in Atlanta see their colleagues in New York and Los Angeles going out to strike everyday and making an impact while they are stationed in Atlanta where that type of movement would not truly help as much as they need it to.