Panoramic from carrollmorgan.com

Severson, Kim. “Stars Flock to Atlanta, Reshaping a Center of Black Culture.” Nytimes.com. The New York Times Company, 25 Nov. 2011. Web. 27 Mar. 2016.

 

In her article “Stars Flock to Atlanta, Reshaping a Center of Black Culture”, Kim Severson, from The New York Times, claims that Atlanta “is emerging as an epicenter of the black glitterati”. To support her claim she begins with talking about the Soul Train Awards being hosted in the Fox Theater and how “a few years ago, the city probably would not have been able to pull off such a show”. She provides statements from Stephen Hill, an executive vice President for BET where he gives his opinion of Atlanta. He says that ” it’s so ripe with African American flavor and talent”. He also says “Atlanta is home to our core audience” and “Atlanta is our New York, our LA”.

Then Severson gives examples of successful black people in the industry who have homes or business in Atlanta such ass, Tyler Perry, Sean Combs, Ce L Green, Ludacris, and Gladys Knight.

She explains the Entertainment Industry Investment Act passed in 2008, “which gives qualified productions a 20 percent tax break” and “producers who embed the Georgia promotional logo in the titles or credits can take another 10 percent off the tax bill”.

Next, she discusses the “decade of migration of black [stars] from the North”. Some of the reasons behind this is cheaper living and lower production costs. Severson provides a statement from Warrington Hudlin, president of the Black Filmmaker Foundation in New York, where he claims that” Atlanta is becoming the black Hollywood” and that “because many black filmmakers are working on tighter budgets than white filmmakers, they need to save money and Georgia helps them do that”. Another benefit of them living in Atlanta is less paparazzi.

The intended audience for this article is people in the film industry. The purpose of her article is to convince them to consider Atlanta as a place to conduct their businesses and do movies in this city .It is also to inform them of some of the pros of living in Atlanta as a person in the film, television and entertainment industry.

This would be a helpful source for someone doing research on how the built environment of Atlanta influences certain races to live there based on the types of careers that they have and how much they are willing to spend to live here.