Office space behind studio gates is in high demand in the Los Angeles area and has been snapped up at other studios by such big Hollywood players as Netflix and Amazon.

"The industry wants to have a location where they can do production and have offices in a self-contained campus environment," said real estate broker Jeff Pion of CBRE, who represents Hackman Capital. "Having all of the different components that make up production in one location is very attractive to the industry."

Plans for Television City also call for a new commissary and more than four acres for production base camps. The streetscapes would be improved to be more visually appealing to passersby, with wider sidewalks.

On Fairfax Avenue, where pedestrians now pass by a fenced parking lot, there would be shops and restaurants serving the public on the ground floor of office buildings that could be reached only from inside the lot.

The separation is part of the balancing act Hackman Capital is attempting to make Television City feel more friendly to the neighborhood while retaining the security and exclusivity of a closed campus that appeals to celebrities and others who make movies and television shows.

Landlords can also charge a premium for office space on movie lots because they are close to the action for independent production companies and offer the cachet prized by many in the entertainment industry.

Filming activity in Los Angeles has fallen off substantially in the wake of strikes by writers and actors last year, according to FilmLA, a nonprofit organization that tracks on-location shoot days and filming permits in the region. The downward trend compounded a dip that emerged in late 2022 as on-location filming in Los Angeles took a dive as studios pared back movie and TV production that surged during the COVID-19 pandemic.

California is finding it particularly hard to rebound from the strikes because it's more expensive to shoot here, multiple production executives told The Times. That makes Los Angeles less attractive to studios looking to cut costs after major industry disruption.

To Hackman Capital Chief Executive Michael Hackman, the downturn and filming pullback from California suggest that regulators and studio operators should further support production companies.

"Our actual customers tell us all of them want to stay in Los Angeles," he said. "We have the best crews in the world here, but we don't have enough modern soundstages in premier locations. We also have to push the state on tax incentives so that we don't lose business outside of the city.

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