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So I lived abroad for multiple years in Thailand. Learned the language, had conversations with people who had never met a foreigner, traveled to numerous surrounding countries. I’ve been to Europe multiple times and stayed with local friends of mine and met their friends. All this not to mention the number of people from around the world I’ve met at hostels and through activities like scuba diving.
People are fucking obsessed with Hollywood. For some people it’s a singular cultural reference point they ascribe to the entire country. When my Thai students were looking into studying abroad, their first questions about a location were about whether it was within traveling distance of NYC or Hollywood. I’ve seen people meet an American who has never even been to California and then jokingly refer to them as “Mr. Hollywood over here!” (And yes, I know that they know all of America isn’t literally Hollywood).
Like, I can understand not liking the amount of American media hegemony that goes on in global culture, that totally makes sense. But it’s definitely a thing.
Especially since you are setting a very low bar here: merely having heard of Hollywood.
Don’t confuse what you might wish for with reality.
I bet that people around the world know about Hollywood and the top actors just like they know Coke everywhere.
The oldest is the French film industry (Gaumont still exists & is the oldest studio still in operation), closely followed by the British film industry (notably Ealing Studios, still the oldest continuously working film facility too).
Hell, the earliest American film industry was in Brooklyn. Hollywood happened initially due to it fleeing to the west coast to avoid patents (ironically) and later the cheaper land.
Because… nobody ever heard of Hollywood?