Los Angeles: in the line of fires

Los Angeles will need time to heal. The apocalyptic imagery of helicopters flying through black and orange skies, buildings in smoking ruins, and people fleeing their homes may have faded from our news feeds, but the damage wreaked by the wildfires in January continues to be catastrophic.

The numbers are chilling. There were 29 fatalities. More than 16,200 structures were damaged or destroyed in the fires, according to Cal Fire (California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection). State Farm General, California’s largest home insurer, maintains it will cost $7.6 billion to settle its claims. UCLA’s Anderson School of Management predicts that the fires will cause a 0.48% decline in county-level GDP across Los Angeles for 2025. That’s a staggering $4.6 billion. The clean-up is estimated to take between 18 months and two years. Only then can the long process of rebuilding the most damaged parts of LA – Palisades and Altadena – begin.

The fires feel like collective sorrow and a wound.

There is talk of ‘survivors’ guilt’. Angelenos recall obsessively checking Watch Duty, the app that emerged as the most reliable source of information about the wildfires. And, across the commercial production industry, there are very real jitters about what this environmental disaster could mean. 

Jessie Nagel, Co-Founder, Green The Bid, and Co-Founder of Communications agency Hype, says: “The fires feel like collective sorrow and a wound… and a number of people in our industry were directly impacted.”

Above: The "obsessively checked" Watch Duty app: the most reliable source of information about the wildfires.

Protecting production

The production industry in Los Angeles was already in trouble before the fires. Its share of domestic production fell from 23% in 2021 to 18% in 2023 following the Writers Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA strikes. Too much red tape and spiralling costs have created a pincer effect which has squeezed out projects. Shoots were already starting to relocate to other production hubs across the US before January; many in the industry agree that the fires have simply given many clients and agencies another reason to select New York, Atlanta, Mexico City, Florida or New Mexico over LA.

Thas Naseemuddeen, Chief Executive Officer at LA-based independent ad agency Omelet, says: “The fires were an exceptional moment of tragedy but they illuminated a much larger macro programme that’s been stirring up over the last decade.”

There were efforts to keep production in LA even when the fires were in full force. Daniel Navatta, the Founder and Director of Bryght Young Things, a creative studio based in New York and California, recalls a social media push to continue shooting in the city, although he had reservations about taking a business-as-usual approach. “I felt uncomfortable shooting in LA at that time, despite having multiple projects on during the wildfires. One shoot was set in a house in Altadena which perished.” 

We’re destroying an industry. There needs to be more flexibility and thought around how to keep work here and how we can be competitive as a state.

He adds: “We ended up moving a multiple day shoot out of Los Angeles because it would have been insensitive to keep it there. Instead, we paid extra to shoot it in Long Beach, California, a few weeks later. Thankfully, our client was a good team player and absorbed the cost. We also moved a sneaker brand’s shoot featuring a helicopter to Ghost Ranch in New Mexico.”

Here, Navatta, who moved to Los Angeles from New York two and a half years ago, hits on an uncomfortable truth: that if shoots go smoothly in other locations, there are serious long-term ramifications for LA’s production community. “I worry about people having experiences [on shoots] in other places and feeling that it was easier or more cost-efficient. And that’s something we’ve got to talk about because it’s driving production away: agencies and brands are looking past LA because they see it as too expensive. These trends are cementing themselves and the risk is becoming permanent. I don’t know if they’re directly tied to the fires, but they’re certainly exacerbated by them.” He speaks plainly. “We’re destroying an industry. There needs to be more flexibility and thought around how to keep work here and how we can be competitive as a state.”

Yet Ogilvy’s Chief Production Officer, North America, Tim LeGallo, thinks that, if anything, the fires have proved LA’s tenacity: “Talk about a resilient community – production has been through a lot with the evolving entertainment landscape, and then most recently the LA fires… There’s an active push to bring appropriate work to LA – we’ve shot there four times since the fires – and there has been a real dedication across the industry to help support displaced crew members and the community at large.” 

He remains optimistic: “So many factors and decisions go into where and how a campaign is produced, and it’s always about what will best meet the needs of the creative circumstances. But LA is the epicenter, and I can’t imagine a world where that is not true. Production is in the city’s DNA as much as the city is in production’s DNA.”

Above: A firefighter works in Castaic, California.

“Climate risk is a business risk which is financial risk”

No one, however, is immune from climate change, as Gabi Kay, a Co-Founder of Green The Bid whose background is in UK commercial production, points out: “These climate weather events aren’t hundreds of years away or thousands of miles away. They’re right here, right now. There’s nowhere in the US or the world that’s protected. Money doesn’t protect you; you can’t isolate yourself.”

The fires should serve as a “wake-up call”, according to Rachel Schnorr,  USA Membership Director at Ad Net Zero, a global initiative to help the advertising industry navigate the transition to net zero. She says: “The fires should start some conversations about contingency plans and hopefully that will lead to better understanding. Some people might still say that wildfires just happen and there could still be a disconnect. But leadership and boards have to pay attention now. Even if they don’t want to do it for sustainability reasons, they have to mitigate future risk.” 

The fires should start some conversations about contingency plans and hopefully that will lead to better understanding.

She adds: “Climate risk is business risk which is financial risk. I’d hope that the fires would propel leaders to develop a strategy at a baseline level and to ask questions about how they’re contributing to unsustainable emissions that are causing these fires.”

She also thinks that this environmental disaster could increase demand for CGI and virtual production as the risk factor – and the cost – is considerably lower. That would be a shame, according to Kay. “We have an incredible wealth of talent here. When you make things with live production, with great creative talent with amazing artisan skills – which LA is full of – there’s a soul to it that speaks to people. It’s important we don’t lose that. It’s on all of us to do everything we can to minimise our impact, slow the rate of change and support one another.”

Above: Volunteers unload a truck loaded with donations at an essentials distribution event at Dodger Stadium on January 17, 2025.

Community service

If the fires have had one positive outcome, it’s that they’ve shown LA’s ability to come together in the face of hardship and provide support for those in need. “I have witnessed true acts of humanity,” states Ogilvy’s LeGallo. 

And it’s certainly true that, when confronted with a climate disaster of epic proportions, Angelenos rallied and showed their resilience, even when they were sheltering in hotel foyers with their pets in cardboard boxes. 

LA is a gig town and we’ve all got to do everything we can to make sure people get gigs.

Kay says: “When you look at how fast and devastating the fires were, the people of LA were gracious, generous and thoughtful. When we were evacuated and sat in traffic, no one was honking or doing crazy driving. That calmness and communal sense of responsibility in such a vast city is a testament to LA.” 

Naseemuddeen adds that her agency is committed to volunteering and providing sustained support, as well as to keeping production in the city. She says: “We’ll always want to stay local. It’s an act of capitalism but also an act of service for your community. LA is a gig town and we’ve all got to do everything we can to make sure people get gigs. Tragedy unites people and I hope we can hold onto that energy and work towards bringing more productions into the city and making sure people who were affected by the fires continue to get support.

"We need to give the city the hope and the energy that it can be the production capital of the country and the world.”