By Megan Sayles, AFRO Enterprise Author, msayles@afro.com
Hollywood actors are battling the Alliance of Movement Image and Tv Producers (AMPTP) after contract negotiations got here to no decision in July. On July 14, SAG-AFTRA, which represents almost 160,000 actors, dancers, stunt performers, voice over artists and different media professionals, went on strike.
This transfer got here a bit over two months after the Writers Guild of America (WGA) started its personal strike with the AMPTP, which remains to be ongoing.
SAG-AFTRA’s major calls for for the AMPTP handle honest wages and the usage of synthetic intelligence (AI) in movies and tv.
“Right here’s the easy fact: we’re up in opposition to a system the place these in control of multibillion-dollar media conglomerates are rewarded for exploiting staff,” wrote SAG-AFTRA in a press release on July 17. “The businesses represented by the AMPTP, which embody Amazon/MGM, Apple, Disney/ABC/Fox, NBCUniversal, Netflix, Paramount/CBS, Sony, Warner Bros. Discovery (HBO) and others, are dedicated to prioritizing shareholders and Wall Road.”
The union is particularly asking for an 11 p.c normal wage enhance in 12 months one of many new contract to beat the excessive inflation introduced on by the COVID-19 pandemic and battle in Ukraine. However AMPTP has supplied a 5 p.c enhance, in accordance with a SAG-AFTRA assertion.
Though streaming platforms do pay residuals, or long-term compensation for reruns of TV exhibits and movies, the quantity is considerably lower than these from broadcast TV. Performers need AMPTP to agree on a plan to make sure they obtain their justifiable share of streaming income.
In a Deadline Hollywood visitor column on July 19, Duncan Crabtree-Eire, govt director and chief negotiator for SAG-AFTRA, mentioned actors earned a median wage of $46,960 in 2021, whereas movie and tv studios make greater than $12 billion annually.
“I’m an actor, and I’ve initiatives which can be on streaming platforms proper now, and a few giant companies are benefiting and making billions off of it. That is the case with each actor proper now,” mentioned Maryam Basir, a member of SAG-AFTRA. “Content material is being consumed virtually solely on streaming platforms, and that’s brought on an enormous shift.”
Basir started professionally appearing in 2020. She mentioned some folks overestimate how a lot cash actors make. Though gross pay could seem excessive on the outset, performers lose cash in taxes and have to offer a share of their earnings to managers, brokers, attorneys and publicists.
“Plenty of us have households and youngsters that we’re supporting. It’s simply time to reevaluate issues,” mentioned Basir. “As expertise advances and income go up, the quantity that everybody is making must also go up in a good means.”
Chantal Maurice, a member of SAG-AFTRA, mentioned she thinks streaming platforms exploit performers. She’s been appearing since 2014 and highlighted the very important function residuals pay in maintaining actors financially secure.
“I believe the good thing about streaming is that it permits extra folks alternatives to guide jobs and inform tales. Nevertheless, residuals are crucial to actors financially,” mentioned Maurice. “For these firms to have this attain and never pay us our due on the subject of residuals is simply unhappy. It makes me, because the expertise, really feel as if they don’t worth the work that we, as actors, convey to their initiatives.”
Each Maurice and Basir have their very own companies to complement their incomes in between appearing jobs. Maurice owns CoStar Teaching, whereas Basir not too long ago launched magnificence model, Maryam Magnificence.
“It’s essential for actors to diversify their earnings. I personal an appearing studio the place I coach actors, however along with instructing them concerning the craft, I train them concerning the enterprise,” mentioned Maurice. “Typically they (actors) say, ‘I don’t wish to have a job, I wish to be a full-time actor.’ I inform them that despite the fact that it’s a fantastic aim, it doesn’t make them any much less of an actor to have a nine-to-five job.”
A serious a part of SAG-AFTRA’s strike entails the usage of AI expertise in movie and tv. The union claimed that AMPTP desires to scan background actors’ digital likeness and pay them for a half day’s work with the intention to use their picture in future initiatives in perpetuity.
It additionally asserted that the alliance desires to make use of actors’ pictures, likenesses and performances to coach AI expertise with out getting permission or offering pay.
AMPTP denied the primary declare in a press release on July 13, writing: “The declare made by SAG-AFTRA management that the digital replicas of background actors could also be utilized in perpetuity with no consent or compensation is fake. The truth is, the present AMPTP proposal solely permits an organization to make use of the digital reproduction of a background actor within the movement image for which the background actor is employed. Every other use requires the background actor’s consent and bargaining for the use, topic to a minimal fee.”
AI has already been utilized in movies and tv for various years. Administrators use the expertise for visible results and computer-generated pictures (CGI).
Paul Sluimers, founder and managing director of Revel AI, mentioned he understands actors’ considerations concerning the expertise, however he thinks the central drawback is one in every of belief between actors and studios. His firm makes use of AI to seize performers’ digital picture and to create content material for commercials and the broader leisure trade.
“I believe that the actors have a legitimate level. Clearly, they don’t really feel like they’ve a superb enterprise relationship with the trade, so there isn’t any belief. They’re afraid of not figuring out the way it’s going for use,” mentioned Sluimers. “I believe they’re proper that AI can be utilized in unfavourable methods, however it is also utilized in good methods for the trade. It shouldn’t be a instrument to interchange folks.”
At this level, Sluimers mentioned AI will not be superior sufficient to fully eradicate actors.
He defined that it may be employed to change performers’ look in order that they’ll seem youthful or older when it’s required in a script. It may also be used for performers who wish to guide commercials however are too busy with different initiatives to be on-site for filming. Sluimers mentioned this might create jobs for different stand-in actors.
In different circumstances, AI could possibly be used when an actor dies in the midst of filming a challenge or sequence, so administrators would not have to rent alternative expertise.
“We simply wish to defend our likeness simply to be sure that it’s not going for use in any means with out our permission and with out compensation. As actors, our likeness is all that we’ve got,” mentioned Basir. “It’s how we characterize ourselves. If somebody can take that and use your likeness for no matter, that’s not proper. I don’t agree with that.”
Editors notice: As members of SAG-AFTRA, Chantal Maurice and Maryam Basir can’t publicize previous, current and future initiatives below the union’s strike order.
Megan Sayles is a Report For America corps member.
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