Everybody who needs to be in the room when SAG-AFTRA and the studios sit down for talks next week will be.
09.09.2023 - 23:49 / deadline.com
“The cracks in the employers’ walls are getting deeper everyday.”
Such were the proclamations of SAG-AFTRA’s National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland during his second day at TIFF.
Standing in solidarity with Canada’s ACTRA commercial actors union in front of Amazon’s Toronto offices –who’ve been in a 501-day contract lockout here in the Great White North with ad agencies– Crabtree-Ireland ridiculed the shopping site streamer which has been one of the stones for actors and writers reaching an agreement with the AMPTP.
Yesterday, during a sit-down chat with Indiewire’s Anne Thompson, Crabtree-Ireland acknowledged the distant business agendas of both legacy studios like Disney, Warner Bros, Paramount etc, and consumer driven tech streaming corps like Amazon and Apple in talks.
” These companies would replace their human workers with algorithms,” said Crabtree-Ireland today on the streets of Toronto.
“In the case of Amazon, a company that regularly avoids paying billions of dollars in U.S. federal taxes, and spends immense sums on stock buybacks instead of boosting wages for their workers,” said SAG-AFTRA’s Chief Negotiator.
“The assertion that Amazon can’t afford to compensate their employees fairly — that’s absolutely a myth, it’s ridiculous.”
“We cannot continue to allow these huge conglomerates to destroy our communities and the livelihoods of individuals.”
He called the upside down of corporate CEO’s swelling pay and lower worker pay “greed-flation” whereby expenses for housing, education, healthcare and groceries spike, but workers’ wages remain the same. Crabtree-Ireland quoted a stat that CEO pay has spiked 500% since 1978.
“Shame!” yelled ACTRA protestors in response to
Everybody who needs to be in the room when SAG-AFTRA and the studios sit down for talks next week will be.
Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Lead negotiators for SAG-AFTRA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers will head back to the table on Monday, Oct. 2, after a bitter concurrent strike led by the Writes Guild of America was resolved on Tuesday. “SAG-AFTRA and the AMPTP will resume negotiations for a new TV/Theatrical contract on Monday, Oct.
This is Day 76 of the SAG-AFTRA strike.
Michaela Zee SAG-AFTRA members have voted to authorize a strike against the video game industry. The vote was 98.32% in favor of the strike authorization against 10 major video game companies, with 34,687 members casting ballots, representing 27.47% of eligible voters. While the authorization does not guarantee a work stoppage will occur, the vote permits union negotiators to call for a strike for a new Interactive Media Agreement if necessary.
SAG-AFTRA members have voted overwhelmingly to authorize a strike against 10 of the major video game companies. The vote was 98.32% in favor. A total of 34,687 members cast ballots, representing a voting 27.47% of eligible voters. The guild’s last strike against the gaming companies, in 2016-17, lasted 183 days. The guild, meanwhile, has been on strike against the film and TV industry since July 14.
SAG-AFTRA, which has been walking with the writers since day one of the WGA strike, was quick to congratulate the guild Sunday after reaching a tentative agreement on a deal.
Matt Donnelly Senior Film Writer Media watchdog GLAAD released its Studio Responsibility Index on Thursday, using its annual ranking of queer representation in mainstream films to stand with striking unions SAG-AFTRA and the Writers Guild of America. Convening in-person at the Los Angeles LGBTQ Center’s Ed Gould Plaza in Hollywood, leadership from both show business unions, queer talent and GLAAD CEO Sarah Kate Ellis spoke of the dangers that work stoppages from the strokes pose to inclusive storytelling.
With the actors’ strike now in its 63rd day, SAG-AFTRA leaders are ramping up their rhetoric against the studio heads, accusing them in the latest issue of the SAG-AFTRA Magazine of “behaving like petty tyrants,” “would-be feudal lords” and “land barons in feudal times.”
As the SAG-AFTRA strike clocked its 62nd day, and the WGA’s 135th, the former held a massive solidarity march today from Netflix HQ on Van Ness Blvd to the Melrose gates of Paramount to juice guilds’ spirits with the entertainment industry work stoppage running past Labor Day.
Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer SAG-AFTRA held a massive march and rally outside the Paramount studio on Wednesday, as the union marked 62 days on strike. Union leaders argued that the strike has resonated across industries, as workers stand up to “unchecked corporate greed.” “What’s at stake is bigger than just the entertainment industry,” said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the union’s executive director. “It’s about the livelihoods of everyone who needs a job to earn a living.” He urged actors to use their voices and authenticity to speak for the broader labor movement.
Filmmaker Karan Johar, who was in the 6ix to attend the prestigious Toronto International Film Festival, got chatty with ET Canada’s Sangita Patel about the success of actress Priyanka Chopra.
Michaela Zee Jessica Chastain is encouraging independent producers to sign interim agreements amid the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike. “If a majority of independent producers, come forward and sign the Interim Agreement deal it will show the AMPTP how wrong they are when they say our contract terms are unrealistic or unreasonable,” Chastain wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter, on Sunday.
As Ben Hardy touched down in Toronto for TIFF for the premiere of his film “Unicorns” on Friday, the UK-born actor hit up a red carpet interview with ET Canada’s Dallas Dixon to discuss his support from the LGBTQ+ community and how he achieved a sizable derrière.
SAG-AFTRA’s presence at TIFF continued into Saturday with a special picket outside Amazon offices here in Toronto with Canada’s commercial actors union ACTRA, who’ve been in a 501 day contract lockout with the country’s advertising agency’s org.
OK, so there was one good deal point –one– to come out of the AMPTP talks with the WGA, as SAG-AFTRA National Executive director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland admitted at TIFF today: It was the streamer’s transparency on viewership numbers.
Amid the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strikes, “Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour” has an interim agreement set in place.
He brought zing to a sleepy Comic-Con, and he’s raising the humidity levels here at TIFF. SAG-AFTRA Chief Negotiator and National Executive Director Duncan Crabtree-Ireland took the stage at the festival to give a post-Labor Day update on talks; and still it’s the same old story: The actors haven’t heard zip from the studios about moving forward.
SAG-AFTRA’s National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator in a pitstop at TIFF revealed that the Taylor Swift: Eras Tour concert film, which is poised to open to $70M-$100M has a SAG-AFTRA interim agreement.
With SAG-AFTRA members already on strike against films and TV shows and voting now underway to authorize a separate strike against the video game industry, the guild’s leaders are saying that a dual strike, if it comes to that, “makes sense” because the issues at stake in both contracts “mirror” each other.
The new season of the West Lothian History and Amenity Society begins this month with a talk about someone you’ve probably never heard of - Francis Metcalfe, soldier, adventurer - and conman.