1.
British-born Danny O'Brien runs Watford Moving & Storage. 'There is a mass exodus from Hollywood,' he says.
'And a lot of it is to do with politics.' His business is booming. 'August has already set records and we are only halfway through the month,' he tells me.
'People are getting out in droves. Last week I moved a prominent person in the music industry from a $6.5 million [£5 million] mansion above Sunset Boulevard to Nashville.'
'Liberal politics has destroyed this city,' he says. 'The homeless encampments are legal and there's nothing the police can do. White, affluent middle-class folk are getting out. People don't feel safe any more.'
2.
Lou Ferrigno became friends with Schwarzenegger when both worked out at Gold's. While he might not be quite a household name like Arnie, Ferrigno starred in the TV series The Incredible Hulk and became one of the wealthiest bodybuilders in the world, with a fortune of $12 million.
President Donald Trump appointed him to his council on fitness, sports and nutrition in 2018.
But Ferrigno, for all his impeccable connections, has become fed up with what he describes as the 'dramatic decline' in LA. He and wife Carla recently sold their £3 million home in Santa Monica and moved into a 7,146 sq ft mansion two hours north of LA.
Carla says: 'One morning around 7am I opened the curtains in our beautiful Santa Monica home and looking up at me from our driveway were three gang members with tattoos on their faces sitting on our retaining wall. They were cat-calling me and being vulgar. I motioned I was going to call the police and they just laughed, flicking their tongues at me and showing me their guns.'
Her husband added: 'We put the house up for sale after 40 wonderful years and moved north. We feel lucky to have made it out. Now we are in a wonderful place and very happy.'
3.
Renee Taylor, an Oscar-nominated screenwriter and actress who appeared in the hit TV sitcom The Nanny, recently sold her Beverly Hills home after half a century and moved to the East Coast.
'I feel so sad for my friends left in Beverly Hills who had to suffer through looting and rioting,' she says. 'I got out just in time.'
The virus only made matters worse. There are homeless encampments in some of the most instantly recognisable tourist traps.
Stretches of Hollywood Boulevard – embedded with glittering stars representing those who achieved their dream of fame and fortune – resemble a Third World shanty town rather than the heart of America's second-largest city.
Outside the Chinese Theatre where Marilyn Monroe and other screen icons are immortalised by their handprints in concrete, the Michael Jackson and Superman lookalikes who usually pose with tourists have been replaced by vagrants begging for change.
4.
Veteran publicist Ed Lozzi says: 'The city was changing before coronavirus brought us to our knees. The homeless problem has been escalating for years, exacerbated by weak politicians making bad decisions.
'Hollywood has always been the wokest of the woke, so politicians have done nothing to stop people sleeping on the streets. It's not illegal and the weather's nice, so they keep coming.
'There is insufficient housing, inadequate mental health care. Add in Covid and it's a perfect storm.
'When I first arrived in LA 40 years ago, the town smelled of orange blossoms. Now the streets stink of urine. There is a beautiful park in Westwood but you can't go there because there are people slumped on the ground and you step on a carpet of needles.
'White flight is real. The elites and middle classes are leaving. People are taking losses on the sales of their homes to get out.'
The divide between rich and poor has never been more glaring. Just yards away from Gold's sits the sprawling LA headquarters of internet giant Google.