What You Need to Know about the WGA and SAG-AFTRA Strike
(Photo: Mike Blake | Reuters)
by Ashley Griffin, Stage Directions
On May 2nd the Writers Guild of America (WGA) which represents 11,500 screenwriters went on strike after contract negotiations fell through with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) is a trade association based in California that represents over 350 American television and film production companies in collective bargaining negotiations with entertainment industry trade unions.
On July 13th, after their own negotiations fell through, SAG-AFTRA (the now unified Screen Actors Guild and American Federation of Television and Radio Artists representing approximately 160,000 film and television actors, recording artists, and other film/T.V artists) went on strike along with the WGA. This is a historic strike. The first time the two unions have been on strike at the same time in sixty-three years.
Historically, entertainment unions have gone on strike when serious questions need to be answered about the potential future of new technology – such as when VHS showed the potential to significantly alter the way artists were compensated. But this strike is not about the potential future of new technology. It’s about technology that’s already here and is devastating artists at the heart of the entertainment industry because, let’s be blunt, of how studio executives have used it to benefit their greed while deliberately taking advantage of, and screwing over artists.
Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the current COO and General Counsel of SAG-AFTRA, said this today at the announcement of the strike when commenting on what AMPTP claimed was a “groundbreaking” offer on how to address A.I. in cinema moving forward.
“This ‘groundbreaking’ AI proposal that they gave us yesterday that our background performers should be able to be scanned and get paid for one day’s pay and their companies should own that scan of their image, their likeness to be able to use it for the rest of eternity in any project they want with no consent and no compensation, if you think that’s a groundbreaking proposal I suggest you think again.”
I’ve already talked about how A.I. is severely negatively affecting the entertainment industry: but that’s just one reason why this strike is happening. It’s come to my attention that there are people who think this strike is just the response of “greedy artists” who want “another mansion” and are bleeding AMPTP dry. I’m hoping that that way of thinking is primarily out of ignorance, AMPTP deliberately misrepresenting things, and because many people not in the entertainment industry honestly don’t understand the ins and outs of the way the industry works.
This is a situation of dire importance that will forever affect the ability of artists to, frankly, exist and survive. No, I’m not being over dramatic. This is really serious and something I care about very much. So let’s talk about what the issues really are:
A.I.
I said this in my discussion of A.I., but it bears repeating here.
On May 15th, Justine Bateman shared a series of Twitter posts with revelatory information about the likely future state of A.I. in the entertainment industry. Bateman is an American writer, director, producer and former actress. Her posts (here listed together) read as follows:
“SAG ACTORS:
I want to talk about AI and how it will affect you. I’m a former ASG Board Member and former SAG Negotiating Committee member. I’m also WGA and DGA. As a coder and someone with a computer science degree I want to tell you where I believe AI is going.
1.) AI – written scripts & digitally-scanned actors (image and/or voice). Both already exist. Some talent agencies are actively recruiting their clients to be scanned. You choose the projects and get 75 cents on the dollar. Your digital image can be triple and quadruple booked, so that bodes well for a 10 percenter.
2.) Films customized for a viewer, based on their viewing history, which has been collected for many years. Actors will have the option to have their image “bought out” to be used in anything at all.
3.) Films “ordered up” by the viewer. For example, “I want a film about a panda and a unicorn who save the world in a rocket ship. And put Bill Murray in it.”
4.) Viewers getting digitally scanned themselves, and paying extra to have themselves inserted in these custom films.
5.) Licensing deals made with studios so that viewers can order up older films like STAR WARS and put their face on Luke Skywalker’s body and their ex-wife’s face on Darth Vader’s body, etc.
6.) Training an AI program on an older hits TV series, and creating an additional season. FAMILY TIES, for example, has 167 episodes. An AI program could easily be trained on this, and create an eighth season. We only shot seven.
AI has to be addressed now or never. I believe this is the last time any labor action will be effective in our business. If we don’t make strong rules now, they simply won’t notice if we strike in three years, because at that point they won’t need us.
Addendum: Actors, you must have iron-clad protection against the AI use of your image and voice in the SAG MBA or your profession is finished. Demand it from @sagaftra and do not accept any AMPTP proposal that does not have it. Needless to say, no @IATSE crew members, no @Teamster drivers, and no #DGA directors will be needed. At first these efforts will be run by software project managers, and eventually even they won’t be needed.”
Residuals
Residuals are earnings artists get every time a film, T.V. episode, etc. is re-shown. If I’m a principal actor on a successful T.V. show, I get a weekly salary while I’m filming the show, but I also get a little paycheck every time an episode I filmed re-plays on T.V.
If I’m in a movie that starts getting shown on T.V I get a residual check. If I’m a writer on a film or T.V. show and my project comes on TV (or other platforms) I get a residual check. Residuals are vital to a film/T.V. artist’s financial survival and, besides that, it’s just rightful compensation for work. A T.V. station earns money from advertisers when they show a movie or T.V. show.
The artists who created that work are entitled to a tiny portion of all that advertising money. It’s the same thing as a theater writer earning royalties when their play is licensed and it’s the primary way a lot of artists are able to financially survive during periods where they may not be on a T.V. show or booking lots of roles. But, over the past couple of decades, those residual checks are getting smaller and smaller. And I’m not talking about “Oh no, I only got 1 million dollars instead of 1.1 million dollars!” I’m talking about residuals going from being enough so you don’t have to worry about paying rent, to literally getting checks for two cents – for the same project.
This has only gotten worse with streaming.
When streaming services first started creating original content was a bit like the wild west. Netflix’s “House of Cards” and “Orange is the New Black” were the canaries in the coal mine for the situation we’re facing today.
SAG has, for a while, had a contract called the “New Media” contract. It was originally created to allow members to, honestly, create YouTube videos. There were basic protections in place, and there were stipulations for compensation, but basically, it was, “We know this is a little, probably self-produced thing that isn’t going to make a bunch of money, so pay what you can, here are the basic guidelines, and don’t take advantage of anyone.”
The problem was, that was the ONLY contract in existence for any content created to be solely accessible on the internet. So when Netflix decided to create its own content, guess what? They used the New Media contract. And they took advantage. On July 12th The New Yorker published an article titled: “Orange Is the New Black” Signaled the Rot Inside the Streaming Economy” which frankly only scratches the surface at the ways artists were not properly compensated for their work on what was at one time the biggest show in the world.
These issues have continued with other streaming services too and, among many, many problems, is the question of residuals. Streaming services pay their artists almost no residuals at all. That is partially because no one forced an answer to the question “In a model where viewers are paying a monthly subscription fee, there aren’t advertisers, and viewers can watch a single episode as many times as they want, how do you figure out a paradigm for fair residual compensation?” But it’s time that was addressed.
Pay in General and Working Conditions
Screen pay has decreased by 14% over the last five years. Writers are being treated like disposable freelancers and threatened (deliberately and literally) by having their jobs taken over by A.I. Studios have taken a bullying approach – “You’d better work in the conditions we’re giving you or we’ll make your job completely obsolete.” Actors are having the same thing happen to them.
Also, previously, networks would order upwards of twenty episodes for a show that would span over a time frame of around ten months. Over the past few years, the number of episodes has gone down to eight to ten episodes meaning more writers and actors have to find more gigs frequently in order to make ends meet.
The WGA also wants there to be a minimum staff in writers’ rooms. SAG-AFTRA is asking for minimum pay rates, improved working conditions, and regulations on self-tape audition requirements. The rise in self-tape auditions has led to production companies passing on audition costs to actors who now have to purchase backdrops, lights, mics, recording and editing equipment, find readers, and become their own film crew just to have a shot at being seen by a casting director and having more self-tape auditions means that productions can now call in thousands of actors for a role they previously would have seen only hundreds or dozens of actors for (and no, this doesn’t mean more actors now get a shot it means more actors are wasting their time on an audition that may not even be seen by a casting director at all.)
We’re about to quickly find out just how important writers and performers are to the creative process. Writers often go unnoticed – but literally, none of the content you consume would exist without them. Writing is a craft, an art, and freaking hard work. It’s not something we should do for almost no compensation because “being fulfilled in our job should be enough”.
When the pandemic hit, we all turned to art to help us through. We might not be seeing the hit now, but give it a couple of months. Let’s see what life is like with no new T.V. shows or films. And that’ll go on for a while. In a couple of months, everything that can be released will have been released and there will be nothing new. Let’s say the strike ends in a couple of months. Or even sooner (let’s hope). It’ll be another few months for production to start back up, complete filming and post-production. We’re in for a long haul of seeing just what artists mean to us and our society.
On June 27th more than 300 actors including Meryl Streep, signed a letter to the SAG-AFTRA Leadership and Negotiating Committee stating that “We hope you’ve heard the message from us: This is an unprecedented inflection point in our industry…We feel that our wages, our craft, our creative freedom, and the power of our union have all been undermined in the last decade. We need to reverse those trajectories.”
Fran Drescher, when announcing the strike, went on to say:
“This is a moment of history and is a moment of truth. If we don’t stand tall right now, we are all going to be in trouble…We are all going to be in jeopardy of being replaced by machines and big business [sic] who care more about Wall Street than you and your family.”
Deadline reported on July 11th, “Warner Bros Discovery, Apple, Netflix, Amazon, Disney, Paramount and others have become determined to ‘break the WGA,’ as one studio exec blatantly put it. To do so, the studios and the AMPTP believe that by October most writers will be running out of money after five months on the picket lines and no work. ‘The endgame is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses,’ a studio executive told Deadline…” Deadline goes on to say, “The studios and streamers’ next think financially strapped writers would go to WGA leadership and demand they restart talks before what could be a very cold Christmas. In that context, the studios and streamers feel they would be in a position to dictate most of the terms of any possible deal.”
This is not about the top tier of the Hollywood elite. This isn’t about a multi-Oscar winner wanting an extra summer home.
This is about the hundreds of thousands of Americans who earn their living from the entertainment industry. That actor who pops up here and there in various commercials and T.V. shows and you go “Wait, I’ve seen them somewhere before…” The writers whose names you’ve never heard work tirelessly every day to turn out moving, quality scripts in a time frame that would make you panic.
That movie you saw at the start of the pandemic that made you laugh and gave you a moment of joy…don’t the artists who gave you that deserve to be able to eat? That’s not an exaggeration.
Do I deserve to be able to eat and pay my rent?
For artists out there who are trying to figure out what exactly this means for them (there are grey areas that are confusing about projects that can or can’t be worked on,) here are some guidelines:
Triple-check with your union before you sign onto any project. It is likely that there will be projects that move into production which may be tied to AMPTP members attempting to engage non-union talent in what should be covered work. Folks working on these projects will be considered as crossing the picket line, so, even if you are not SAG-AFTRA or WGA, touch base with those unions about any non-union projects you’re considering to make sure that they’re not work-around projects which would potentially affect your ability to join the union in the future.
Some work can still happen – certain sorts of unscripted shows, reality shows, game shows, soap operas, specific kinds of animated projects, and some commercial projects may move forward.
SAG-AFTRA will be allowing independent projects to continue under provisional, temporary contracts. They will be vetting the producers to ensure there isn’t some sort of tieback to an AMPTP member. There will be lists of these approved projects.
Not only can you not shoot or work on struck projects during this strike, but you also can’t audition, develop, or promote any work which would have been covered under this agreement.
Here’s some advice from Casting Director Erica Bream on what you can do during this time:
PICKET! If you live in LA, NY, Atlanta, or any other places where pickets are actively happening, strap on your comfy shoes, grab some sunscreen, and get ready to walk in circles. The show of solidarity and passion is hugely important.
VOLUNTEER! Do you want to be a Strike Captain or Lot Coordinator? A Neutral Gate Monitor? JUMP IN. Your union will need people to step up to help keep the train running.
USE SOCIAL MEDIA! Talk about why you're striking, connect with fellow union members, and spread the word to non/industry folks. Use hashtags like #1u #SAGAFTRAStrong and others.
APPLY FOR ASSISTANCE IF NEEDED! The Entertainment Community Fund is offering financial assistance for industry participants. @tusctogether has been formed to help with healthcare needs. Your union will likely have a fund you can apply to as well. If you need help, don't be afraid to ask for it. We all know what everyone is sacrificing with these strikes. There is zero shame in seeking assistance.
LOOK FOR UNION GUIDANCE! Confused about what is ok to work on or audition for? What is forbidden? What are your rights? The union will put out that information. Ask questions, if needed.
WORK YOUR DAY JOB! The more financially stable you are, the longer you'll be able to withstand a strike, and that weakens the studio's key pressure point.
FIND A CREATIVE OUTLET! Make sure you still have something that juices your creative passion so you don’t burn out on this cause. Class, self-tape practice with friends, a writing group, a play, etc.
BREATHE. You’re not alone. You are supported in this cause by craftspeople across the entire industry.
For EVERYONE:
Please stand with artists. Show your solidarity. Support us. Even a social media post can go a long way towards sending a message, or even just raising spirits. If you want to, consider canceling your streaming subscriptions until the strike is over. When you’re asked why you’re canceling your subscription, write:
We support the WGA/SAG-AFTRA members and stand in solidarity with them.
Go see live theater! A lot of WGA/SAG-AFTRA members also work in the theater. No is a great time to go see a live show!
This strike is going to have an effect on every industry – and I don’t mean that in a cryptic “L.A. is going to lose a lot of income” way. I mean that the issues WGA and SAG-AFTRA are fighting for are issues that are going to affect everyone sooner or later. They’re coming to your industry too. And I support you and your unions in standing against them as well.
I am an artist. I am a union member. I stand with WGA/SAG-AFTRA. All I, and my fellow artists, are asking for is the opportunity to make a living, and continue making art for you under fair conditions.