SANTA CLARITA, California, June 16 - Inside a vast sound-stage that houses one of the elaborate sets constructed for the Amazon Prime Video adaptation "Fallout," writer and producer Jonathan Nolan emphasized the pivotal role state tax incentives played in keeping the production in California.
The series, a large-scale adaptation of a videogame set in a post-nuclear landscape, filmed its first season in New York. California attracted the production for season two with $25 million in tax rebates, Nolan said, and the show remained in the state for a third season after receiving $42 million in tax credits on a $166.3 million budget.
Seated on a folding lawn chair on the set of a "Vault" - a subterranean fallout shelter dressed in the shows retro-futuristic aesthetic - Nolan said bluntly, "If the tax credit wasn't here, it would be a non-starter and we wouldn't be able to be here."
Nolan has been an active proponent of California's expanded incentive program, which saw lawmakers approve $750 million in tax rebates intended to draw film and television production back to the state. He has publicly showcased the production to state legislators, inviting them onto the set last year to highlight how the rebates translate into work for actors and the broad range of craftspeople who support a shoot.
According to the California Film Commission, the season three package allowed the production to employ nearly 600 crew members and roughly 30 actors. Those figures were cited by Nolan as tangible evidence that the credits were delivering the intended economic activity on the ground.
Industry observers and practitioners have watched production patterns shift in recent years. Nolan said many in the business had grown used to flying to locations such as London, Budapest or Sydney for shoots - often without considering how that migration affected Hollywood and the local workforce.
"People sort of laughed at the idea that Hollywood would ever stop being Hollywood - but I think the last five years, it really has," Nolan said.
That shift has coincided with a contraction in entertainment employment since a peak in late 2022, narrowing job opportunities for actors, writers and the myriad tradespeople whose livelihoods depend on film and television work, from carpenters and costumers to camera operators and caterers.
California's film and television workforce has been particularly affected. Data from the Milken Institute show the state shed 17,234 jobs between 2019 and 2023. The report attributes this loss to multiple dynamics, including declining television advertising revenue and stagnating streaming growth, factors that prompted studios to seek lower-cost production locales.
Sound-stage utilization in greater Los Angeles has also fallen. Film LA, which coordinates filming in the region, reported an occupancy rate of 62 percent in the first half of 2025, down from near-full occupancy in 2016. Nolan warned that such declines threaten to "hollow out and destroy a 100-year cultural institution" central to American cultural production and global cultural reach.
Actor Walton Goggins, who plays two roles on the series - Cooper Howard, a pre-war Hollywood actor known for Westerns, and a bounty hunter called The Ghoul - expressed appreciation for the chance to work in Los Angeles again.
"This job permeates every aspect of this city and so to be back here filming this show that employs this many people - artisans that are the best in the world at what they do, given the opportunity to operate at their highest level - I'm in awe," Goggins said. He added, "I only hope that this tax credit expands so that more production can come back here."
Context and implications
The sequence of tax rebates and credits that helped secure season two and season three of a major streaming series illustrates how state-level incentives can influence location decisions for big-budget television production. The credits supported a substantial local payroll and a large crew complement, a point Nolan and others used to make the case for continuing and expanding incentives.
At the same time, the broader entertainment sector faces structural pressures cited in recent studies and industry commentary: reduced ad revenue for traditional television and slower growth across streaming services. Those pressures have real consequences for studio decisions about where to allocate production budgets, and for regional labor markets that historically depended on a concentration of production activity.
For California, the rebates represent a policy response aimed at stemming employment losses and restoring higher levels of sound-stage utilization in greater Los Angeles.