Task Force On Industry’s Recovery

The Hollywood Professional Association announced early this month the formation of the Industry Recovery Task Force. The Burbank trade group for the production and post-production segments of the entertainment industry said the focus of the task force will be on the sustainable resumption of creating content and understanding how to do it in a world impacted by the coronavirus pandemic. Association President Seth Hallen said the task force has the goal of getting the industry back to work and to do it in a way that provides not only safely creating global content but understanding the long-term impacts to workflows, technology, people and the business. Productions began to shut down in early March as the pandemic worsened in the U.S. All production stopped once the state’s stay-at-home orders were issued. “It has always been core to the mission of HPA to connect and collaborate with the larger content creation community,” Hallen said in a statement. “In these challenging times, we have both an obligation and an opportunity to help navigate, educate and lead our industry.” The key activities of the task force are to serve as a forum for collaboration, communication, and thought leadership regarding how to resume global production and post production in a sustainable fashion; understand and influence evolving technical requirements such as the impact of industry remote collaboration, work-from-home and other workflows which have been highlighted by the current crisis; provide up-to-date information and access to emerging health and safety guidelines that will be issued by various governments, municipalities and unions; and provide collaborative support and guidance to those impacted by the crisis. Hallen said the association would not be leading this effort alone. “Our goal is to partner with other key professional associations and organizations to be able to speak with the knowledge of both our HPA community and the larger industry to find the best plans, ideas and path forward as we emerge from the crisis,” Hallen said in the statement.  “Through this effort, we expect to help define and build a more resilient industry for tomorrow.”