EXCLUSIVE: Hawking A price and tax plan for “tax incentives to” make Hollywood Grand again “, Jon Voight thinks that Donald Trump is the biggest president since Abraham Lincoln. The Oscar winner said Trump loved the entertainment sector so much that he wanted to save him from himself. But with the Midnight cowboy Star and its inner circle making a number of films themselves abroad and Canada, their hypocrisy seems obvious and perhaps selfish.
To this, Voight was not available Thursday, but we discussed with Trump's special ambassador to Hollywood Special Advisor, Steven Paul and SP Media Group / Atlas Comics, president of the comic strip Scott Karol to talk about their productions, prices, prices, and more.
Freshly out of a meeting in Mar-A-Lago with Trump and Voight this weekend, the duo was the architects of the MHGA proposal to Trump to bring production to America and South California in particular. Breakdown in recent days, the land, which has published exclusively this week, the Pitch published on May 4 to punish the fleeing productions. This punishment would be “a 100% price on all the films that enter our country that are produced abroad”.
Quoting conversations with guilds, executives and officials of the state of Hollywood, Paul and Karol say that their five -page proposal is not the end, being all in the matter and “was for discussion purposes”. And, yes, a discussion takes place. However, the fact that they and Voight made films like this year High and 2024 Air Force One Down in Bulgaria, and 2023 Mercy In Vancouver, Canada puts a stench in its MHGA position.
DEADLINE: The majority of your SP SP productions are turned outside the United States, that is, Bulgaria and Canada. This is a subject that happens when you make the Hollywood Super again! ” proposal. Does all the impulse to remove this plan from the soil linked to the constant shooting outside the United States?
Steven Paul: Although it is nice to visit the south of France for Cannes, when you work all the time, you prefer to be back home. Not only that, but (here) in Hollywood. This place was designed for cinema. It is completely crazy that it is a ghost city at the moment. You walk in the studios and you find them completely empty.
DEADLINE: Okay, but You have shot films in Bulgaria and Canada, don't you think it is hypocritical to be behind the “Make Hollywood” initiative when you did nothing to do with that?
SP: We are exact that shout how we have to join together, create incentives and make films here in the United States, everyone is chased abroad, including us. We have already made ourselves to make three films in Hollywood and to buy this little studio. So it is not hypocritical, we are the example of what happened.
We all (producers) cannot make it work here. We would be delighted to make it work here. We were forced to go there. It is an industry in difficulty, we need government assistance, we must all come together.
DEADLINE: Are you trying to open a studio here?
SP: From next week, we will close on a small studio. These are not essential images. A small studio that has a few sound steps. We are therefore trying to commit ourselves to Hollywood to show that we want to make films here. We are already talking about three films to shoot here.
Scott Karol: I want to save and talk about this to note that it is not producers who go around and continue the last dollar. Not just us, but in the past two months, and in the past four days, we have spoken with a number of producers, studios and streamers, and it is the difference in making a film or a television program and not to do it. It is not a question of making more money. This comes down to profit and loss. There is a calculation that must be done and you have to go where you can afford to shoot the film. The increase in the costs of filming in America at the moment is the difference between the profitability of many of these films – the studio films – and not profitability. And on a list of films, it leads not to make films. If the studios are not even breaking on films, they cannot make films. It is a question of somewhat leveling the rules of the game. Make things comparable and not to continue the last dollar, which I call the endless race at the bottom, and create an environment where producers, studios and streamers can bring films closer to the United States?
(LR) Steven Paul, Scott Karol and Jon Voight
Getty
DEADLINE: The new lot in southern California?
SP: It is here in the Los Angeles region.
DEADLINE: What do you think of the argument of the governor of California Gavin Newsom for a federal tax incentive of $ 7.5 billion?
SP: It's good to say, but you really get involved and try to do these things. We cannot just make statements and throw ideas. We tried to sit with him. It has not yet happened, but we tried to meet him to see how we can work together and do something like that.
SK: In Gavin's tweet he put, he suggested that we use the “successful” Californian program as the basis of federal incentive. In this document published by Deadline, there is a segment that talks about the tax credit in California and the problems with it. It is not competitive with other states. The ceiling is so artificially low to compete with places like Georgia, does not include above the line, it is not transferable unless an independent production. We have heard a number of studios and banners that it is incredibly problematic for them. You think “Oh Studios can harm this”. No, they can't; It is only against Californian income. So, unless you are Disney and have Disneyland here, or Universal can, but many of these companies are structured so as not to have Californian income or minimize Californian income. It is not transferable, so it is not so precious. There is no reciprocal provision such as article 181 in the federal tax code as at the state level, therefore your statement of income of the State seems different from your declaration of federal income. There are all kinds of things that should change the Californian program to make it work. Then it would be an excellent plan for federal tax incentives, but it is not what it is currently.
DEADLINE: Studio leaders with whom we have spoken, what makes them nervous are the whole points of the prices. They ask: these are not incentives rather than punitive measures? Are you going to always explore the prices? He has a lot of nervous people
SP: The document we presented to the president was for discussion purposes. There were ideas that we obtained from an assortment of conversations in the city, and not everyone agrees on just as you know. We are a great supporter to obtain tax credits here in the United States to make us competitive in the world. Having been with the president, he is an entertainment lover, he is everything to do entertainment activity because he said: “Bigger and better and bigger than ever”. He means. He wants to do everything he can try to help. So if something was perceived as injuring the company. I don't think he wants to do something like that. He wants to do everything to be useful.
DEADLINE: The other dilemma with prices on cinematographic productions – it is digital, which cannot be a tariff. It's not like a car or a washing machine.
SK: Obviously, we are not political experts with regard to this, nor the legislation. I think the concept of having a kind of stick with all the carrots we proposed was the idea. Whether you call it a price or if you call it something else, it's not really the point. If you level the rules of the game in such a way that all the heads of studios and banners, that all things being relatively equal or near being equal, they would only choose to shoot in America. Unless there is a creative reason not to do it. The idea is to create a creative environment where you have created this playground, but there is a quote a “bad actor” which decides to take a place elsewhere; there is a kind of penalty for that; there is a kind of stick to improve the carrot even more. I think people have hooked too much on the word price. The idea is that there are carrots and sticks in this world.
SP: We just spent all these thoughts, everyone had different ideas and stuff, all that was a document for discussion points, was not supposed to be shared with the world.
DEADLINE: Fynyn,, Where does it come from?
SP: It was one of the conversations that came to talk to producers, directors, unions and everyone. This represents all the different sections of conversation on the minds of people.
SK: Fynyn is not only a matter of economy, it is also creativity. You look back towards television made before the dismantling of Fynsyn – Norman Lear, the golden age of television when the creatives had the program. There was an incredible desire that an increased creativity be injected into the medium that is produced. We have still heard that producers. Since this deadline for a deadline was released, they loved this concept of Fynsyn.
DEADLINE: Do you envisage a certain budget range with regard to tax credits? Because medium -sized films are really injured with regard to independent funding.
SK: As a percentage of the budget, I think you find that larger studios can be less carried out by a budget percentage. A large studio can have an impact on $ 20 million at $ 30 million and this can differentiate between profitability and loss. On a smaller film, and I will go down to a film of $ 5 million at $ 10 million; A film of $ 5 million shot in Eastern Europe can cost $ 10 million to $ 12 million in the United States, and can make the difference between making the film or not making the film. I would say that independent producers are also carried out at all levels from a percentage. There are breaks on labor rates for teams, and AI, for lower budget films, but it is always infinitely more expensive.
DEADLINE: What is your chronology? Studios and MPa are about to meet…
SK: We are in direct contact with all the groups we have met, including the MPA, the guilds and the producers. Our plan is to work in conjunction on an advanced basis and to be in the room together on what the details of these proposals look like and what ends up being legislation.
DEADLINE: Would you say that you are more on the side of the tax credit than the price side?
SP: Absolutely.
