WE HAVE THE SCOOP FROM INSIDE TINSEL TOWN – WHAT’S IT’S LIKE TO BE CONSERVATIVE IN A CITY OF FLAKES AND MORE ARE ‘COMING OUT’ EVERY DAY NOW—BUT NOT ENOUGH FOR OUR WRITER TO FEEL SAFE USING HIS REAL NAME (AND STILL HAVE A CAREER!)
The following article is written by a closet ‘Conservative’ who works in Hollywood but is afraid to tell anyone. More and more conservatives are ‘coming out’ every day now in Hollywood – but not enough for our writer to feel safe using his real name (and still have a career!)
“We need signet rings. Like a secret society.”
I was half joking, but how else are we supposed the recognise each other?
You can never be too careful, especially when outing yourself as anything but “Left of Lenin.” It can literally spell the end of your career.
We seem to be a dying breed; the Conservatives of the entertainment industry. Encountering one another in the wild feels akin to two endangered leopards crossing paths in the Himalayas: perpetually hunted and damned to a life of solitude.
On the surface, Hollywood’s Conservative constituency appears to be a fringe group that the Leftist Elites successfully banished to B-movie exile long ago.
But as Clint Eastwood famously reassured us in his 2012 RNC speech, “Conservative people by the nature of the word itself, play it a little more close to the vest… But believe me they’re there”.
Maybe Clint was right. Maybe, amongst the sea of Liberals there’s a syndicate of Right wingers operating in the shadows.
But when the Eastwoods, Voights, and the Woods of the world finally die off, who will be left to defend Hollywood’s Conservative bastion? Will there be anyone left to talk some f*cking sense into this town?
“It’s so refreshing to talk to someone with different opinions for once,” Alisa (name changed for the sake of anonymity), a twenty-something film exec said to me during a meeting arranged by my agent.
Up to this point, we had coyly tested the waters, trying to gauge each other’s political stance by making references to increasingly Right-leaning writers.
I told her I had just ordered Dan Crenshaw’s new book. “He’s pretty palatable even by Democrat standards,” I thought, “Let’s see how she reacts.”
She responded by telling me she had just finished Dinesh D’Souza’s latest.
Success! I had finally found someone in the industry that I could talk openly with, someone with whom I could share ideas even if they are outside of the Left’s ever-shortening list of approved messaging.
Within a week we would be exchanging articles from the Daily Wire and Breitbart.
The daughter of Russian immigrants, Alisa had spent her whole life in LA and watched local officials tax and regulate her city into a liberal dystopia.
As I write this today, the economic powerhouse that Reagan built finds itself plagued with an 11.4% unemployment rate, a quarter of America’s homeless population, and a business climate ranked 48th by The Tax Foundation.
Not surprisingly, 13,000 businesses left California between 2009 and 2016. Today, an average of 5.5 business per week are making plans to join them, including the likes of Toyota, Charles Schwab, and Tesla.
The politics Alisa’s parents had hoped to leave behind in the USSR have seemingly made their home in the Golden State under the guise of Liberalism. But the question remains: the film business is still a business, so when will they finally be fed up with California’s oppressive regulations and where will they go?
Now that the state’s top earners are staring down the barrel of Biden’s potential 62.6% tax, it’s no wonder there’s a mass exodus of celebrities and common folk alike.
The latest census revealed our most populated state saw its slowest year of growth since 1900.
Elon Musk, Kanye West, Joe Rogan, Chris Hemsworth, Matthew McConaughey, and Nicole Kidman have all either taken up residence elsewhere or have made plans to do so.
As the British government taught us in the 1970s, taxing the rich into oblivion just means they’ll make their vacation homes their permanent homes.
But even if La La Land is no longer home to the stars, movie studios will still put down roots there, right?
Well, sort of.
Where a movie gets filmed is mostly dictated by local tax incentives. That’s why a movie like Cold Mountain, set in Civil War era North Carolina, gets shot in Romania.
Or why a slew of studios seemed to pop-up overnight in Georgia (the state, not the country) which offers a 30% tax credit.
Abroad, the incentives are even more attractive. Ireland, Romania, and British Columbia boast credits up to 37, 45, and 47.5% respectively.
Productions will continue to chase incentives no matter where they are, and right now the juiciest ones domestically are in Georgia, Louisiana, and Ohio.
So, while the major studios like Paramount or Universal – now relics of Hollywood’s golden age – may stay firmly planted in LA, we’ll continue to see the bulk of new studios being built elsewhere.
Though the California government may try as it might to make businesses feel unwelcome, there are those who will never leave. And admittedly, in spite of its hair-brained policies, California is still one of our most beautiful and resource rich states, making it well worth saving.
The question I presented earlier remains: in a sea of Leftists, who will stand up and dissuade our most Socialist of Comrades?
I think our only hope lies in the Alisas of the world; the sons and daughters of immigrants who know first-hand the horrors of Socialism and as a result, appreciate America for the tenets upon which it was founded.
Nowhere was this more evident than in Miami-Dade county where 55% of Cuban-Americans, wary of Socialism’s false promises, chose to vote for President Trump.
Alisa is not alone. There’s a high-powered agent who’s the son of Egyptian immigrants, a Chinese-American ad exec, “We’re all in a group chat,” Alisa confides.
In my search for Hollywood’s Conservatives, I’ve found this to be true time and time again: Second generation Americans will save this country.
Last month, street artists erected two-story letters spelling TRUMP in the style of the Hollywood sign overlooking LA’s Interstate 405.
Not surprisingly, the city was swift in their removal, citing concerns about distracted drivers.
But let moments like these serve as a reminder to Alisa and her Commie-fighting cohorts whenever they feel alone… We are still out there.
Anonymous Screenwriter/Director
Hollywood, California
