By Richard Mason
The entertainment industry has had a lot of picketing in 2023 as the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and Screen Actors Guild (SAG-AFTRA) both started striking over grievances relating to modern dilemmas in showbiz.
The WGA’s reasons for striking included protections from the use of AI to do their jobs, the unsurprising demand for higher pay for writers’ efforts on projects, including traditional and streaming releases, as well as further spending on benefits.
On Sept. 24, the WGA came to an agreement with the studios and production companies, ending its 146-day strike.
Nonetheless, SAG-AFTRA is still on strike, keeping Hollywood from returning to business as usual.
SAG-AFTRA has similar requests to their writer counterparts such as increased pay for streaming releases and protection from AI using their likenesses. The issue that is cited as the wedge issue between the union and the big companies like Discovery-Warner is the revenue sharing demand. This proposal is detailed in the SAG-AFTRA’s initial demand list referring to the ever-important streaming market and compensation on that front.
Streaming cannot be stressed enough as being the biggest platform for film, television, and all video projects in the modern age. In 2021, the the total investment amongst the big services for new projects exceeded 100 billion dollars.
Streaming services aren’t too open about their exact finances, so going back to 2021, it was reported that HBO Max had 63.9 million global subscribers and Netflix had 208 million global subscribers. There is a lot of money going into these platforms, but the workers behind the products aren’t getting their fair share.
The pay actors receive from streaming as set by the industry standard. With pre-streaming distribution, actors received residual pay from secondary distribution such as television syndication (re-runs) in addition to their initial pay. But with streaming distribution, actors only receive their initial pay from a project. As a reminder, the members of SAG-AFTRA are not just lead actors. SAG membership includes dancers, background actors, and other performers who work in film and television.
The demands of the actors’ guild have been accepted by a few productions already, allowing work to continue for those select jobs. Some studios have made agreements with the guild by accepting their demands on individual projects. Considering the amount of money in the industry and the progress made so far, the demands are not unfeasible.
It can’t be ignored that there are people striking around the country today and their efforts matter just as much as the WGA and SAG, if not more. While not as glamorous as being on the silver screen with the rich and famous, United Auto Workers has assembled a strike across multiple plants belonging to various car manufacturers. Their plight is one of generational suffering and exploitation and deserves nationwide attention. The fight for a living wage is a fight that goes beyond the level of education, race, and geography.
