A glossy campaign video from LA mayoral hopeful Nithya Raman is racking up views, and drawing sharp pushback, as she casts herself as Hollywood’s would-be rescuer, even name-dropping her high-profile husband, Vali Chandrasekaran.
“Look around,” Raman says in the video, standing on a quiet studio lot. “Lots like this used to be full of people… Now these lots are quiet.”
She calls the crisis “personal,” pointing to her husband, a prominent television writer, and warning that families across Los Angeles are losing work as production dries up.
The message is polished. The timing is political.
Because despite the urgency in her pitch, the film and television industry has not been a defining focus of Raman’s record at City Hall.
City records show that in the six years on the Los Angeles City Council, Raman has not introduced a single piece of legislation aimed at supporting the industry.
And, when the council took up seven measures in March 2026 to address permitting, production and infrastructure, she recused herself from four, citing conflicts tied to her husband’s work.
Along with not taking action on Hollywood-specific measures, Raman has also voted against efforts to make parts of Los Angeles more usable.
Just last week, Raman voted against establishing an anti-camping enforcement area in Venice, a high-traffic corridor just blocks from the beach and an area used for the production of Baywatch.
The Gram video rollout has also drawn scrutiny from industry insiders.
Carl Muhlstein, a longtime Los Angeles broker behind major Hollywood deals, said the video itself raised questions, including where it was filmed.
The shoot appears to have taken place on a Burbank studio lot, not in Los Angeles.
“Both of us thought, ‘Gee, that’s Disney’s lot in Burbank,’ and here she’s running for the City of Los Angeles,” Muhlstein told The Post.
“Burbank has a Class I police and fire department. They have no gross receipts tax. You don’t see homeless tents,” he added, pointing to the contrast.
He said the messaging itself isn’t necessarily wrong, but the timing raises questions.
“Everything she says is right… I’m just not sure her delivering the message is appropriate,” Muhlstein said.
And the decline, he added, didn’t happen overnight.
“This has been a slow burn. It didn’t just happen overnight.”
He also pointed to confusion in the policy debate, noting that many of the solutions now being discussed, particularly tax credits, are largely outside the city’s control.
“She talks about tax credits, which has nothing to do with the city. That’s a state issue,” he said.
Still, Muhlstein noted the industry is not standing still. While traditional production is contracting, newer segments, including digital and social media-driven content, are evolving, creating pockets of growth even as legacy jobs disappear.
The economic stakes are massive.
Los Angeles County has already lost more than 40,000 film and television jobs in recent years, with employment dropping from roughly 142,000 to about 100,000 by the end of 2024.
Production is shrinking rapidly. Nearly 30% fewer major projects began shooting in 2024 compared to 2022, followed by another 13% decline the next year.
In Los Angeles, production activity has fallen to levels not seen in decades outside of the pandemic.
The impact is rippling far beyond studio gates.
Workers who once built stable middle-class careers in the industry are draining savings, losing healthcare and leaving the state. Small businesses tied to production, from catering companies to prop houses, are struggling or shutting down entirely.
“It’s not dramatic to say that the result has been personal financial ruin,” one business owner said.
Raman’s campaign argues the city’s own policies are part of the problem.
“Los Angeles is losing Hollywood,” she said in a statement. “Not because productions want to leave, but because we’ve made it too hard for them to stay.”
Raman’s campaign said her plan calls for a centralized film office within the mayor’s office, faster permitting timelines, lower fees for independent productions, fewer filming restrictions and an aggressive push for expanded state and federal tax credits.
But those proposals are now colliding with the realities of both her record and the limits of city authority.
A spokesperson for Karen Bass pushed back, telling The Post:
“In over 5 years on the City Council, Nithya Raman has never authored a single piece of legislation to help the film industry — zero. And when there was legislation to vote on, she legally recused herself four times. That’s not the leadership our film industry needs. Mayor Bass created the state’s first film & TV tax credit, helped expand it to $750 million, and took action to cut red tape and open up more iconic LA locations to filming. And just today, Mayor Bass cut fees for small productions to make it cheaper to film in LA.”
Raman entered the mayor’s race on the final day of filing in February, jumping into what had been shaping up as a relatively stable contest.
The election will unfold in two stages, with a June primary followed by a November runoff if no candidate clears 50 percent of the runoff.
