By: David Sutherland, Senior Lecturer, University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business
When you look at Creative Economies closely, it becomes clear that the Film and Television Industry is pivotal in their success. Film and Television draw indirectly from a myriad of related creative industries, such as graphic design, fashion, culinary and music.
In fact, when the state of California reviewed it’s $507.4 billion (direct income) Creative Economy this year, it found that the $413.6 billion Entertainment segment of that Creative Economy, which includes Film,
Television and Digital Gaming, generated an additional $210 billion in indirect income adding to the total
value of their Creative Economy of $980 billion (direct and indirect income). (“2023 Otis Report on the
(California) Creative Economy”)
So, what does that say for us here in Georgia? As I’ve said before, it is difficult to compare Creative
Economies due to the variation in definition, but when we look at the Georgia Film (and Television) Industry
we declare a direct income value of $4.4 billion. But we declare the overall value of our Creative Economy to
be around $29.2 billion, which includes some of the indirect income for the Film Industry, but this has not
been attributed in a way like California has done. The overlap of creative industries should be considered,
and the new study being done by the Georgia Council for the Arts on Georgia’s Creative Economy must
reflect this to understand the full impact of the Film Industry.
As an example of this overlap, I was recently involved in the filming of the feature film American Deadbolt at
the UGA/Athena Studio in Athens. With a waiver from the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), Director and writer
Bryan Redding and producers Christos Hines and Clint Ross, managed to engage a pool of local Athens
technicians and talent; from cinematography to costume design to actors to carpenters, to painters, to
electricians. In addition, he was also able to contract talent from LA to perform in the film, adding name
recognition and credibility. All this bringing additional income to hotels, restaurants, bars, and shops along
with an engaged vibe from many others in the Athens community.
What amazed me was the level of engagement and professionalism of the 54 diverse individuals involved in
the film, including a few students from UGA’s Master of Fine Arts in Film (a Georgia Film Academy
participant) gaining real-world experience. The intensity of their work, their camaraderie off the set and their excitement about what they were creating was contagious.
Redding, a hearing-impaired director, and cinematographer (that’s another amazing story) and his production team kept things rolling through the strike (including a SAG official visit to ensure the stipulations of the waiver were being honored), a tornado that kept power out for 3 days while shooting continued, providing impressive housing and meals for the out-of-town talent, and the ongoing challenge of fund raising. To me this exemplified the power of the Georgia Film Industry as a major pivot point for our Creative Economy.
And this all feeds into the idea of Creative Clusters that I described in my last article. Using the 24
Georgia Film Academy locations around the State, particularly in rural locations, we should leverage the great draw our Georgia Film Industry has developed to build out these clusters by attracting film and television projects that will connect to and stimulate local creative offerings and the communities in which they thrive.
But of course, there are the strikes, where I sense a significant change coming not only to the Film and
Television industry, but to other creative Industries as well. It all remains to be seen what may be coming, but in my next article I am going to relate my perspective and experience to the impact technology will have on the Creative Economy, including the complex domain of Artificial Intelligence. It will be a brave new world, and we in Georgia should be leading the way!
David is writing a series of articles for us and also speaking at the Georgia Unscripted Roadshow. For more information, please contact us.
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David Sutherland has been an entrepreneur, a corporate executive (formerly Vice President of Innovation, Computer Sciences Corporation) and a trusted innovation advisor to a set of companies including CIRT Tech, Blink Interactive, NASA, BMW, Siemens, and Bank of America. David is an active participant in several startup ecosystems, including Austin, Texas, Boulder, Colorado, as well as Palo Alto, California.
As a Senior Lecturer at the University of Georgia’s Terry College of Business, David teaches courses in Entrepreneurship, Design Thinking, and runs seminars on the topic of Creative Economies. In addition to the Terry Executive Education Program. David has lectured at Universidad de los Andes in Bogota, Colombia, CEDIM Design Institute in Monterrey, Mexico and GISMA Business School in Hamburg, Germany.
David received a Ph.D. from the University of Virginia and he resides on a farm in Athens, Georgia, with his wife Sarah, dog Norah and a variety of horses.
