The aim of the book is to provide a comprehensive theoretical and empirical analysis of the economic geography of Hollywood. For Scott, “Hollywood, in its current incarnation, is one of the most remarkable examples of a successful industrial agglomeration anywhere in the world” (p. 58). Although the author claims that one of his objectives is to show how Hollywood developed over the twentieth century and came to dominate global markets in entertainment, the book is not a work of history, but rather one that describes and analyzes the various product, production, and labor-supply characteristics of contemporary Hollywood. A historical backdrop is provided, but this is necessarily schematic, although useful information is provided in the form of maps about the spatial organization of Hollywood, circa 1915 and 1930.

Scott's thesis is familiar. Hollywood is an industrial district, consisting of a dense cluster of production and servicing units that are strongly interdependent, and that generate positive externalities. To a large extent, the competitive advantage that this agglomeration brings to the incumbents has counter-balanced any propensity for firms to disperse to lower-cost locations. These externalities give form to a tripartite industrial structure, enabling small “independent” firms to coexist alongside the “Majors” and their subsidiaries and closely associated firms. Evidence for this has been the rapid growth of the independent sector since 1980, measured both in terms of employment and firm formation. During this period, the “Majors,” while retaining their vertical reach, have become part of larger multinational media and entertainment conglomerates. As during the “Classical” period, circa 1920–1950, the “Majors” dominate Hollywood, but they now operate as part financiers, as well as producers and distributors, through a set of multiple profit centers by means of a complex web of arm's length contracts. The “Majors” no longer take all of the risks associated with production, which they did in the “Classical” phase of their development.

For the researcher, untangling this contractual network is problematic, given the “paucity of data” (p. 9). Scott is hampered in his endeavor by a lack of contractual information describing the fine detail of the relations between firms that would have allowed him to map interfirm networks. His method is to collect disparate empirical evidence that “admittedly falls short of finality” (p. 9). Thus, he draws widely on official publications for industrial classification and employment data in the Hollywood area. Perhaps the most novel data that Scott brings to his subject are residential location patterns of different categories of film industry labor—craft, writer, agents, and managers—provided by their respective trade unions/guilds. For the most part, the author is satisfied to analyze the descriptive statistics that he presents in a set of useful tables, but occasionally is tempted into the realm of modeling as he seeks to measure the strength of explanatory variables governing the spatial spread of production facilities and those factors affecting the number of films made in-house, and with independent participation by the “Majors.”

The book is well written, with detailed chapters on television, studios, soundstages and sets, digital visual effects industry, local labor markets, and Hollywood in America and in the world. Scott has a good grasp of the debate about the nature of Hollywood and brings to it the tools of a social scientist. His analysis is measured and evidence-based, and his conjectures about the likely duration of Hollywood's domination of world markets are balanced and drawn from a wide literature, which he discusses knowledgeably. However, as an economic historian, I would have welcomed a fuller exploration of the breakdown of the old studio system, and the change in firm formation and contractual relations in the face of the rapid decline in the market for films on theatrical release that occurred during the period 1950 to 1980. I was also disappointed that the author did not examine the media-platforms revolution that has taken place with regard to sources of revenue, where today only approximately 30 percent of film revenues come from worldwide theatrical release. Further, the absence of any references to the work of economic historians, such as the recent excellent paper by Stephen Broadberry and Andrew Marrison (“External Economies of Scale in the Lancashire Cotton Industry, 1900–1950.” Economic History Review 55, no. 1 [2002]: 51–77), leaves Hollywood, and Scott's conjectures about it, contextually unlocated in relation to our knowledge of the salient characteristics of other industrial districts.

Nevertheless, Scott has produced a refreshing book on Hollywood. His perspective is one of a geographer, and his method that of a social scientist. He produces plentiful evidence to support his thesis that contemporary Hollywood should be conceived of as a tripartite industrial structure, and the book represents a major contribution to our understanding of it.