AFPRepresentatives of actors’ union SAG-AFTRA during the press conference
NOS Nieuws•vandaag, 05:48
The members of the actors’ union SAG-AFTRA support the agreement that negotiators reached with the film studios earlier this week. According to the association, the three-year contract that has been signed has a value of more than $1 billion. The deal finally ended the actors’ strike after almost four months.
The union announced in a press conference that the minimum wage for actors will increase by 7 percent. A bonus for successful productions has also been agreed with streaming services such as Netflix and Disney+. That earns actors and the union $40 million a year.
Agreements have also been made about the use of artificial intelligence by major film studios. According to the union, an AI-created likeness of an actor may only be used if that person is also paid for it. It must be the same amount that an actor would have received if the person had worked on the set themselves.
Billions in damage
The end of the actors’ strike means Hollywood can run at full speed for the first time since May. Screenwriters also went on strike earlier. They left work because of roughly the same grievances as their acting colleagues: according to the unions, life in big cities like New York and Los Angeles has become so expensive that lesser-known actors and writers can no longer keep their heads above water. This requires a higher minimum wage, they say.
The TV and film writers’ union reached an agreement with the studios in September, after which they returned to work. However, the actors continued to strike. Both strikes have cost the American entertainment industry a huge amount of money: research agency Milken Institute estimates that they have cost the state of California more than six billion dollars in economic activity.
Because striking actors are no longer allowed to do promotional work by their union, already completed films were left on the shelf: the premiere of blockbusters such as Dune 2 was therefore postponed. Other highly anticipated films like the new one Mission: Impossible and the new version of Disney film Snow White have now been moved to 2025.
2023-11-11 04:48:55
#Hollywood #actors #union #supports #deal #studios #strike #finally
