California Today: L.A. Transforms Into Iowa for the Final Season of ‘Veep’

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/10/04/us/california-today-veep-los-angeles-iowa.html

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Los Angeles has over the years provided the backdrop for all sorts of television shows and movies: Westerns, science fiction, war movies and cops-and-robbers. In recent weeks, a corner of the county has been transformed into something else: the state of Iowa in the midst of a presidential campaign.

The cast and crew of “Veep” have descended upon the San Fernando Valley to film episodes of the final season of the HBO series. Its main character, Selina Meyer, played by Julia Louis-Dreyfus, is making a bid for the presidency; and what road to the White House doesn’t lead through Des Moines? (No spoiler alerts here because — well, we don’t know what happens next season.)

Among the locations: the Underwood Family Farms in Moorpark, which has been tricked up to look like a fair. “They already had a bunch of animals and farm stuff like giant pumpkins, and we added a few rides, as well as games and deep-fried foods on a stick,” said David Mandel, the executive producer of “Veep,” whose lively Instagram feed has been offering a running chronicle of the adventure.

With its scrubby hills and mountains, Los Angeles — particularly the San Fernando Valley and the Santa Monica Mountains — has easily lent itself to shows like “Gunsmoke,” “Bonanza,” “Batman” and “M*A*S*H.” But Iowa?

Mr. Mandel said it wasn’t hard to make Los Angeles look like Iowa, “as long as you don’t see palm trees or the mountains.” He said the director of the show, Morgan Sackett, is from Iowa and had a decided idea on exactly how things should look.

For those who haven’t been, the Iowa State Fair is one of the great pleasures of Des Moines, and it is an inevitable stop for political candidates from both parties. It is big and sprawling.

Mr. Mandel said that while the state fair inspired the scene, he couldn’t quite replicate it. “Because of the time of year we are saying and because we can’t do something as big at the state fair, we made it more of a smaller county fair that the candidates are visiting as part of their Iowa campaign,” he said.

(Please note: We regularly highlight articles on news sites that have limited access for nonsubscribers.)

• The White House sent the F.B.I. inquiry of Judge Brett M. Kavanaugh to the Senate and expressed confidence in his Supreme Court confirmation. [The New York Times]

• California’s war against the Trump administration is costing the state millions in fees related to 44 lawsuits. [The Sacramento Bee]

• The Trump administration and the broadband industry are fighting back against California’s net neutrality law, but a bigger fight is being waged in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. [The Los Angeles Times]

• The Republican Party’s attack on California’s net neutrality laws show that it no longer believes in federalism, an Op-Ed contributor writes. [The New York Times | Op-Ed]

• The attorney general’s office quietly canceled its inquiry of a law prohibiting government-funded travel to states with policies that California leaders view as discriminatory against gay and transgender people. [The Sacramento Bee]

• The mayor of Osaka, Japan, ended the sister city relationship with San Francisco over a statue honoring World War II “comfort women.” [San Francisco Chronicle]

• A court decision in favor of Huntington Beach, which aimed to exempt itself from California’s sanctuary state law, hints at the escalation of a legal standoff. [Pacific Standard]

• A federal judge in San Francisco blocked the Trump administration from ending special protections for more than 300,000 immigrants from four countries devastated by war and natural disaster. [The New York Times]

• Undocumented migrant farmers are a part of life in the Central Valley, where towns like Mendota feel under attack again as rumors and ICE raids increase. [The California Sunday Magazine]

• “Despite intensive global media coverage of the Northern California wildfires, it’s hard to capture the visceral feeling of being in a smoke-filled landscape where everyday life is disrupted.” A writer explains how the wave of deadly blazes has altered both the land and the psyche. [Scientific American]

• The first robotic farm in the U.S. opened in San Carlos, where fully articulated robots lift containers and maneuver around crops. [San Francisco Chronicle]

• Data from a Fitbit was used to charge a 90-year-old man in his stepdaughter’s killing in San Jose. [The New York Times]

• A statue of Prospector Pete, a divisive symbol of the treatment of indigenous people during the Gold Rush, was removed from Long Beach State. [The New York Times]

• Apple used to know exactly what consumers wanted, our magazine’s tech columnist writes. But its watch’s sluggish takeoff reveals cracks in the company’s mythology. [The New York Times]

• The actor Priyanka Chopra is a tech investor, too: Her investments will skew heavily toward companies with an element of social impact, and companies founded by women. [The New York Times]

• In Malibu, several new hotels offer stylish rooms in a beachside enclave better known for millionaires’ mansions or bare-bones motels. [The New York Times]

In a romantic garden in Southern California, a Chinese opera is performed under the stars. But only 40 people a night get to see it.

The audience wanders through the Huntington Library, Art Collections, and Botanical Gardens in San Marino along specially illuminated pathways, bridges and pavilions. The dreamlike performance is inspired by a mix of classical Chinese drama and California history.

“This work grew from the elegance and secrecy of the Huntington Chinese garden,” the playwright, Stan Lai, explained. “When a friend suggested I do a performance in a certain pavilion, I suddenly saw the whole garden as a theater.”

“Nightwalk in the Chinese Garden” runs through Oct. 26. See the photos and read the full story here.

California Today goes live at 6 a.m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: CAtoday@nytimes.com.

California Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from U.C. Berkeley.