By Theunis Bates, Editor at LinkedIn News
With the Hollywood writers strike now in its sixth week, a union representing some 160,000 film and TV actors has voted to authorize industrial action should upcoming contract negotiations with studios and streamers break down. The strike authorization was approved by 98% of the 65,000 SAG-AFTRA union members who voted. The demands of the Screen Actors Guild echo many of those made by the Writers Guild of America, including higher pay and limits on the use of artificial intelligence — especially the use of actors’ likenesses without permission.
- A tentative deal reached by the Directors Guild of America with studios and streamers includes an acknowledgment that AI cannot replace union members.
- New audio tools and chatbots are simulating the voices of actors and other celebrities. But without consent from the public figures involved, they may violate publicity rights, legal analysts told The Wall Street Journal.
SAG-AFTRA members approve strike authorization by overwhelming margin
latimes.com • 2 min read
BREAKING:
SAG-AFTRA just voted to a strike in solidarity with WGA!
This is huge. They only needed 75% of members to agree. They got 97.1%. It’s one of the highest percentages in union history.
This matters if your industry uses union actors and performers at all. So theater, advertising commercials and endorsement deals, corporate events.. all that comes to halt once the picket signs go up.
Like the WGA the actors want a fair cut of streaming, more predictable schedules for show work, more equity in the content they help create. They deserve it too. All us creatives deserve fairness.
Now the only ones not striking are Reality TV performers (who were actually made SAG-eligible as of 2019) who may get pressured to strike anyway, and non-Union digital content creators.
So a eriously, if you’re an ad industry creative or agency you’ve likely been already following this; if not you’re on scramble alert because this affects all the work you’re gonna do with talent.
SAG, Man.
“Without transformative change in the TV/Theatrical contracts, it will soon be unsustainable to pursue a career working under these conditions.”