variety.com: Plagued by global pandemics and industry-wide strikes, Hollywood has experienced an unprecedented era of frugality in the past few years. However, financial experts such as Erin Oremland, general manager of AgilLink and senior VP and head of ecosystem delivery at City National Bank, are working to provide new data and analysis tools to help make managing the business of entertainment more efficient than ever.
8 comments:
It’s interesting to think about the problems with Hollywood right now in terms of business intelligence. Like, yes, technology is very helpful and managing your finances more efficiently can start with just finding the right program or working with the right people who are experts in that particular venture. However, the overall idea of Hollywood needing to “do more with less” itself is a lot to unpack. Yes, entertainment is struggling, but putting less money into projects is actually leading to an overall lack of trust and quality in many places, and taking the time to really invest in artistic projects according to the creator’s vision might increase profits by simply drawing more viewers, rather than trying to work cheaper. I know that’s not really the focus of this particular article, which is more focused on banking/ finance management processes, but the shift it describes got me thinking.
I don’t really think about the automation of transactions often (or, ever), but it was interesting to think about it when I read this article and picture dealing with a large scale project with a lot of money and transactions using only checks and generally dealing with many transactions before online purchasing and banking was a thing. I also think that the idea of doing more with less might apply to the financial and business side of the entertainment industry (like this article discusses) but doesn’t really apply to the industry on a whole – putting less resources into projects and anticipating getting the same level of output from the project isn’t reasonable, and there are many ways to do “more with less” and optimize your resources, but some entertainment is meant to be maximalist and taking away from that isn’t a long term solution. I also think that “automating the exchange of funds between studios and talent” sounds like a great thing for streamlining the process and is likely beneficial to both the studios and the talent.
I am surprised to see that studios have not been using electronic systems to transfer money and keep records until only recently enough to be on the weekly news page. I have been using those systems and record keeping devices for a few years now through the app on my phone. I get that my 50 dollar transfers are very different in scale and process-ability than thousands or millions of dollars, but I still would have thought that this would have been in place earlier. I had not really thought about how money transfers worked for larger companies, I had assumed it would have all been online directly through a bank they made partnership with, however I realize now that not all companies would have exclusive partnerships with banks in order to manage their finances externally. So it is good to hear that it is shifting to be more streamlined for regular in and out of large sums of money.
Honestly this seems like a fantastic idea for the entertainment business. Automating the transferring and management of finances is something that I honestly would’ve assumed a lot of places already did. Checks are honestly something that are going out of use with people day to day because quick money transferring apps like Zelle and Venmo are just much easier that going into the bank to cash a check. The Agilink system mostly just sounds like an extra fancy version of Zelle to transfer larger amounts of money than a simple app like Zelle would transfer. In general checks probably aren’t going to be around much longer with the advancement of technology especially in the banking world. It just makes things easier overall. You can’t lose a check in the mail, no one can lie about what money has/hasn’t been sent because there would be an electronic record of it. I hope for the sake of ease this kind of banking gets adopted by other industries.
I do think Hollywood has been extravagant with a bit too many of their movies, while of course some movies are massively expensive blockbusters. I think some money has been wasted on movies that had no right to be as expensive as they were. This problem is being exasperated by how many big budget films haven't been doing well in the box office, making it seems like all that money was put to waste for a movie that wouldn't make any of it back. However this isn't to say that we should just limit budgets for movie creatives, however being more mindful of how much is spent for movies in the future. The Majority of Hollywood movies don't need a quarter off a million budget, especially if it's not feasible for them to make it back. Instead of Major budgets I think some movies first need to focus on stories and supporting the creative team. I also can't say I understand too much surrounding the finances of movies, but not utilizing electronic systems does not make too much sense to me. Considering how much hollywood utilizes current technology in their industry, its surprising that its been on paper for a while since that seems so much more inefficient compared to the electronic alternative
This is a really interesting article because it has to do with finance specifically in entertainment. Almost all of the time, any business or finance related article is extremely inapplicable to theater, just because of the nature of our industry and how different it is from other industries. They only really mention automated payments and how they’re a lot better than sending physical checks; I’d be interested to listen to the whole conversation and all the topics they discussed. Since United Talent Agency deals mostly with performers, I don’t know how applicable the conversation would be to the world of live theater. It certainly wouldn’t apply to the TDs of the industry. The article does mention that the people at City National Bank are in the process of making finance tools specific to entertainment; I’d be interested to see what comes of that. Again, it’s probably more tailored to performers and Hollywood instead of Broadway, but it’s still interesting.
I appreciate that the article talks about using technology to improve business transactions but I honestly expected a very different article. I think this article does bring up a very relevant issue in the industry which is how we can do more with the limited funds that we have and how to get more funds. The quality of work in Hollywood and the industry at large has gone down significantly. With the understanding that technology and capitalism has wreaked havoc on our creative pursuits, the industry needs to figure out how to use technology as a support and not a crutch and still let creativity flourish. Once that’s figured out, the funding also has to be more picky. I fear that with the grind culture of our world, it’s hard to have to constantly meet deadlines and just churn out work. With that mindset, of course creativity immediately gets kicked out the window.
The discussion at the Variety Entertainment & Technology Summit fascinating, especially regarding how the entertainment industry is adapting during financially challenging times. Erin Oremland's emphasis on leveraging technology to do more with less is particularly relevant across many industries, where streamlining operations has become essential. It's clear that automation, like the systems used by AgilLink, is transforming how financial transactions are handled, allowing for immediate payment processing and reducing inefficiencies. David Garelick’s point about the shift from waiting weeks for checks to instantaneous payments shows how technology not only saves time but also removes stress for clients. This reminds me of similar shifts in sectors like healthcare and education, where administrative processes are becoming increasingly automated, reducing errors and improving user experiences.
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