Stan Kroenke Plans Sprawling Production Facility, Soundstages at Hollywood Park

Sports mogul Stan Kroenke’s sprawling Hollywood Park development in Inglewood, Calif., has big new plans befitting the project’s name — even as film productions continue to flee Southern California.

The Los Angeles Rams owner and chairman, alongside investment firm partner Wilson Meany, on Tuesday announced plans for a major production facility and film studio at the 300-acre development ahead of the 2028 Olympics. First-phase plans for the 12-acre sub-project, dubbed Hollywood Park Studios (HPS), include five soundstages of 18,000 square feet apiece. The developers will also build a three-story, 80,000-square-foot creative office building to support productions, mill facilities, an open base camp zone, and a tall bay garage that can accommodate as many as 60 trailers.

The Los Angeles Times first reported Kroenke’s new plans. 

HPS will initially host the International Broadcast Center for hundreds of media outlets as they cover the 2028 Olympics and the Paralympic Games. After the Games end, HPS will be made available for studio productions. 

Kroenke and Wilson Meany started constructing Hollywood Park nearly a decade ago following the demolition of the Hollywood Park Racetrack. The $5 billion SoFi Stadium, which officially opened in late 2020, is the centerpiece of the development, alongside the 6,000-seat YouTube Theater. Once complete, the project will include up to 5 million square feet of creative office space, a 300-room hotel, nearly 900,000 square feet of retail space and up to 2,500 residences. 

Construction on the first phase of HPS, meanwhile, will begin later this month. 

“The vision for Hollywood Park has always been to build a city within a city, combining media, entertainment and technology that will transform the greater Los Angeles area,” Kroenke said in a statement. “Beyond 2028, Hollywood Park Studios will be open to welcome a new industry to our live, work, play destination and bring a little bit of Hollywood to Hollywood Park.”

The developers could continue expanding HPS on the site as well, should they so choose. Hollywood Park provides for up to 20 more build-to-suit stages, and 200,000 square feet of additional office space to support the productions. Architecture firm Gensler is leading the designs for HPS, with Clayco as general contractor, Pacific Edge as project manager and Guggenheim Investments arranging undisclosed financing. 

SoFi Stadium will host the opening ceremony of the Olympics (alongside L.A. Memorial Coliseum) and Paralympics. The home of the L.A. Rams will then be converted into the largest venue for Olympic swimming in the history of the games.

Kroenke’s decision to build such a large production facility is an unusually risky bet in L.A. these days, an issue few could’ve predicted even a few years ago. 

Media productions are leaving Southern California as the obvious destination to film and produce their projects, particularly in the wake of the 2023 SAG-AFTRA and Writer’s Guild strikes. Roughly half of the soundstages in Southern California are currently empty, Sam Nicassio, Los Angeles Center Studios president, told Commercial Observer in March — a problem ultimately caused by the cost of doing business in the region while so many affordable alternatives arise in other states and abroad. 

The amount of shooting days across L.A. County was down 42 percent in 2024 compared to the post-pandemic peak in 2022, according to the latest Otis College Report on the Creative Economy. A plan by Gov. Gavin Newsom to boost the state’s film tax incentive cap to $750 million per year, compared to its current cap of $350 million, has yet to see fruition, but is expected this summer.

Nick Trombola can be reached at ntrombola@commercialobserver.com.