Lights,camera,STRIKE!!! In May, the Writers Guild of America voted to strike due to a payment dispute between them and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. By July, the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio voted to strike along with the WGA in order to get the amount they were entitled to as well.
The large strike was all started due to a failed contract negotiation earlier this year about increased compensation, better residuals, staffing requirements, and protection from AI job interference among other demands that were all shot down by the AMPTP.resulting the WGA to strike with SAG-AFTRA. following.
But a large threat for these stars lately has been the new presence of streaming and the exclusion of it from contracts. Since streaming is a new thing many stars don’t have contracts that include it, and this is a point of contention for the strike.
According to a letter from the negotiating committee to the AMPTP, “Though we negotiated intent on making a fair deal, and though your strike vote gave us the leverage to make some gains — the studios’ responses to our proposals have been wholly insufficient.”
But the most frustrating and scary thing for these stars and writers has been that they can all be replaced by AI in order to cut budgets. For example, Warner Bros. used AI in “the Flash” in order to use characters without paying actors for their work.
In an interview with “The Conversation,” The union president of SAG-AFTRA, Fran Drescher, says, “We are all in jeopardy of being replaced by machines.”
In addition to Drescher, the strike has meant many known faces of Hollywood lining the streets of L.A. and New York, including Jamie Lee Curtis, Bob Odenkirk and Adam Sandler. Overall, there are 160,000 actors, from -A-listers to C-listers, on strike right now.
While many actors are in support of the strike, some are not.
One reason people have been hesitant to strike is the way the strike delays projects, with some being completely scrapped. For example, the Avatar franchise announced that their release has
changed to December 2031, with no confirmation on a solid release date.
“I do not support striking, I do not,” Stephen Amell said to a fan when asked at a convention in North Carolina. “I find the whole thing incredibly frustrating.”
But even after saying this, Amell was seen on the picket line along with other A list actors. This created a controversial and confusing moment of events that had people wondering if he was truly in support of the strike or if he was just doing this in order to avoid backlash for his statement.
Following all of these strikes, the VFX artists at Marvel Studios have said they will vote to unionize in response to the heads of Marvel Studios rushing their work and pushing unreasonable hours, which impacts their personal lives and mental health.
While actors making movies with big budget companies are not allowed to work while on strike, SAG-AFTRA has allowed small indie production studios like A24 to continue production and release as scheduled.
