Erik Glode and Michele StuevenWhen Venice Beach lifeguard and co-creator of the original international hit TV show Baywatch, Greg Bonnan, accompanied FOX TV executives on a scouting trip for the upcoming series reboot to Australia, they walked along every beach in Sydney and Queensland. He turned to them and asked, “Why can’t we just shoot it in LA?”
First hitting screens in 1989, Baywatch became the most-watched show in the world, airing in more than 200 countries, and at its peak, reaching more than a billion viewers every week.
Shot on the shore near Temescal Canyon, the original series starred David Hasselhoff and helped launch the careers of Pamela Anderson, Carmen Electra, Jason Momoa, Yasmine Bleeth, and others.
The series reboot will celebrate the franchise’s enduring legacy, while adjusting it for today’s global audience. There will be adrenaline-fueled rescues, tangled relationships, complicated chemistry, and beachside heroics that defined the original with a new cast, tensions, and challenges. And yes, there will be hot bods in red bathing suits.
In the continued local and state efforts to bring filming back to LA and with a hefty $21 million tax credit under his belt from the California Film Commission, Bonnan reached out to his local councilwoman, Traci Park, to bring Baywatch home to the Venice Beach Lifeguard Headquarters, where he started his career in 1970.
She didn’t hesitate for a moment to take on the Herculean task.
“Baywatch is probably the most famous television show in the entire world,” Park told LA Weekly recently during an open casting call for the show at Mother’s Beach. “When Greg and his team approached me about potentially bringing back a modern-day reboot and having it right in the heart of Venice Beach, I didn’t even hesitate. It was the potential of a huge investment in our local creative economy, which we all know has been struggling. There was the real threat that we could potentially lose this iconic LA brand to a place like Australia or South Africa. Not on my watch was I going to let that happen. I immediately got to work with my partners at the county, the lifeguards, beaches, and harbors, and got together with the mayor’s team and our recreation and parks dept. to make sure that we had all the agreements and alignment that we needed well enough in advance. It’s the opportunity for Venice to be back in the headlines for the right reasons.”
BAYWATCH: Auditioners at the FOX BAYWATCH open casting call at Mother’s Beach (Greg Gayne / FOX. ©2026 FOPXZ Media LLP)
When Park took office, Venice was considered one of the most dangerous beaches in America and the butt of jokes on late-night TV. Since then, she has been a relentless pitbull in trying to clean up the Westside. Making Venice the location for the reboot resulted in painting and refurbishing the historic 1969 landmark that had become an eyesore.
Her office was at a stalemate with the city and the county on refurbishing the lifeguard headquarters for years. Nobody had the funds or resources to give it the attention it deserved and warranted. Finally, because of Baywatch, they were able to make the repairs needed.
“I told Greg, whatever it takes and whatever mountain has to be moved, we are going to get it done,” the councilwoman said of the Venice comeback story. “It’s an investment in our local economy and jobs. It took a village to make this happen, from working with our lifeguards to county beaches and harbors to the mayor’s office, our own city recreation and parks, site visits, inspections, coastal development permits, film, and tax credits.”
A new showrunner, Matt Nix, has been added to the production, who credits the city and the state for being very active in talking to FOX and Fremantle, saying that there was an application process to qualify and a variety of hoops to jump through. But at least the hoops were there.
New cast members Shay Mitchell, Noah Beck, Hassie Harrison, and Stephen Amell on the set of Baywatch in Venice (MEGA/GC Images)
“Yes, the cast is hot, “ Nix told the crowd at a Gabrielino Tongva Tribe blessing of the new Baywatch Lifeguard Headquarters. “And yes, there will be red bathing suits and slow-motion running on the beach. But there’s a lot more to this show than that. In cynical times, this is a show about people who care and put others first. When our city really needs help, Baywatch is here in Los Angeles, putting people to work and reminding our entire industry that there’s a reason this was the birthplace of the film and television industry. It’s where the best crews in the world are. This is where actors still come to aspire, entertain, and run in slow motion on the beach. There’s no question where Baywatch belongs. Forever and always, we’re always here.”
To the delight of tourists on the Venice Boardwalk, the show started shooting this week. In addition to new cast members Brooks Nader, Livvy Dunne, Hassie Harrison, Stephen Amell, and Thaddeus LaGrone, one returning familiar face is David Chokachi, playing Cody Madison.
“I haven’t done anything of this magnitude in a while,” Chokachi, who became a fire brigade volunteer after losing his home in the Woolsey Fire, said at the open auditions of more than 2,000 hopefuls. “The entire industry just shrank. Everybody is getting squeezed financially – actors, crewmembers. Fox and Fremantle, who fully believe in the show, have sunk a lot of money into it. They revamped a water tank over on the FOX lot that’s the size of a football field. Our tank on the original show was in a parking lot a fraction of the size. It’s not a new show, just a continuation of what we were doing in the 90’s, the heart and soul without a lot of stuff that used to make us cringe as actors. No wrestling alligators in storm drains.”
Returning Baywatch cast member David Chokachi at the open casting call at the Marina Del Rey Marriott (Stewart Cook/Fox via Getty Images)
Greg Reeves, Business Representative Secretary of the Lighting Technicians IATSE Local 728, says the Baywatch model is a great example of everyone working together, and is cautiously optimistic.
Just last week, Senator Adam Schiff held a hearing at City Hall in Burbank that included The Pitt actor Noah Wylie and IATSE President Matt Loeb, drafting a bill to create federal incentives for film and TV production. LA Mayor Karen Bass has appointed Steve Kang, President of the Los Angeles Board of Public Works, as the Liaison to the Film and Television Industry, and in a unanimous vote this month, the Los Angeles City Council approved a package of legislation designed to cut red tape and make film and television production easier in the city
“We’re feeling it a little bit,” says Reeves, who attended the Schiff hearing. “It’s not enough to say we’re back, but we hope that by the end of the year, we’ll be at what represents the new normal. Noah Wiley said it really well. If you’ve been in this business for the past six years, you’ve seen nothing but turmoil. If you’ve been in it for 20 years, you see it as a reset. The perspective is different. It’s baby steps. The incentives are helping. A federal incentive would be amazing.”
Courtesy Mark Hartman/IATSE local 728
As Hollywood is turning a corner, the first steps are being taken. The destination is far, the path will be long. Maybe a lot of the rules need to be rewritten. Maybe this reset in the film industry is the opportunity for the next generation of filmmakers and showrunners to find their new role in an entertainment economy with more screens and destinations for content than ever before.
The recent large-scale labor disputes involving the role of artificial intelligence in motion picture entertainment, the nature of compensation from the streamers, revised working conditions for crew members, among others are all a very real reminder that a lot of uncharted territory lies ahead for Hollywood – including local governments and showrunners working together to make filming in Los Angeles much easier for filmmakers of all sizes once again.
“We’re a blue sky alternative,” says Bonann, who’s still a lifeguard on Venice Beach and practices the three tenets of the job he learned as a teenager: family, service, and teamwork, the core of Baywatch. “ We’re not dark, and we’re not gritty. The murder shows are great, but I want to see something heroic. I want to turn the TV off and feel great. The audience loves first responders, people of service, and heroes who will run into flames instead of running away from them.”
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