#fans4wga

July 21 - "

Voice actors may be one step closer to hitting the picket lines after the SAG-AFTRA National Board put the power to call a strike in the hands of National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland.

On Saturday, the board voted unanimously to allow Crabtree-Ireland to call the strike on services under the Interactive Media Agreement, 10 months after the union’s initial strike authorization vote. Usually, the National Board retains the power to eventually call the work stoppage, making a transfer of power notable.

Any potential strike would be “effective at a time and date to be determined” by Crabtree-Ireland with advance and consent from the National Interactive Media Agreement Negotiating Committee."

"With more than a month to go before IATSE‘s current contracts expires, the union and the studios have come to a tentative agreement on a new deal.

As fears of another Hot Labor Summer had Hollywood anxious, the successful negotiation news Tuesday evening comes a mere two days into the resumption of talks between the parties this week.

Touting wage gains, AI guardrails, and pension and health plans increases, IATSE leaders just sent out the news to its members of its 13 Locals in Hollywood. As you can see below, with increased penalties for extended workdays, safety concerns and crew well-being played a not insignificant role in the bargaining:

Dear Basic Agreement Sisters, Brothers, and Kin: The Basic Agreement Negotiating Committee has reached a tentative agreement with the AMPTP. Below are a few of the details about the proposed deal. A complete summary of the tentative agreement will be released in a few days, and in addition to local town hall meetings, a multi-local webinar will take place on Saturday, July 13th at noon PST to review the proposed language in the Memorandum of Agreement (MOA). To avoid undermining our fellow members in the Area Standards Agreement (ASA) Locals, who remain in negotiations with the AMPTP, we will wait to release full summaries of both tentative agreements simultaneously. Some of the proposed changes in the Basic tentative agreement include: scale rate increases of 7%, 4%, and 3.5% over the three-year term; hourly workers will receive triple time (3x hourly) wage when any workday exceeds 15 elapsed hours, all On Call classifications will now receive double time on the 7th day of the workweek, and additional increases in pay will take effect on non-dramatic productions under the Videotape Supplemental Agreement. The tentative deal includes new protections around Artificial Intelligence, including language that ensures no employee is required to provide AI prompts in any manner that would result in the displacement of any covered employee. These changes in the Basic Agreement are in addition to the tentative agreements reached in the Local Agreement negotiations. For the Motion Picture Industry Pension and Health Plans (MPIPHP), the tentative agreement includes additional payments from employers that would address the $670M funding gap, including new streaming residuals. Additionally, no participant shall incur a break in service for plan year 2023. We thank everyone who participated in the 2024 Basic Agreement negotiations process. From start to finish, your input was invaluable and ensured that our Negotiations Committee was at the bargaining table with clear goals and a consensus for how to achieve them. The ratification timeline will be forthcoming and we look forward to presenting to you the complete package. In Solidarity

The correspondence to members was signed by Tobey Bays of Local 44, Cathy Repola of Local 700, Greg Reeves of Local 728, Bob Denne of Local 729, Chuck Parker of Local 800, DeJon Ellis Jr of Local 80, Alex Tonisson of Local 600, Marcy Brooks of Local 884, Patric Abaravich of Local 871, Karen Westerfield of Local 706, Brigitta Romanov of Local 892, Adam Nestra-West of Local 705, and Scott Bernard of Local 685.

The announcement to members from the Locals leaders was followed within minutes by a joint statement from IATSE and the Carol Lombardini-led Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers:

The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) and Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) announced a tentative agreement on all issues for the Hollywood Basic Agreement and Videotape Agreement negotiations. The tentative agreement is now pending ratification by the unions’ membership. Members and signatories will have the opportunity to review the agreement in the form of a Detailed Summary 2-3 days following this announcement, as well as a Memorandum of Agreement (M.O.A.) an estimated 2 weeks following this announcement. The parties now look forward to closing negotiations for the Area Standards Agreement.

To put tonight’s deal in context, the IATSE Basic Agreement covers the around 50,000 members of the mainly L.A.-based 13 West Coast Locals. The still to be completed Area Standards Agreement is for the 23 Locals across the nation and their 20,000 members.

"No one has said the word “strike” yet, but some of Hollywood’s strongest unions just flexed some serious muscle with the studios.

With their current contracts set to end on July 21, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and Teamsters Local 399 will stand in together in solidarity in upcoming negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. The sit-down with the Carol Lombardini-led AMPTP will begin March 4, sources tell Deadline."

Stay tuned for more news from IATSE and Teamsters regarding imminent contract talks! Just like WGA and SAG-AFTRA, other Hollywood unions re-negotiate their contracts at set points and IATSE (International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees representing Hollywood technicians, artisans and craftspeople) and Teamsters (truck drivers) are re-negotiating too.

"This chart is based entirely on the publicly available information the negotiators (AMPTP & SAG-AFTRA) provided in the PDFs released in July when we went on strike. SAG’s official position on these terms is highlighted. Disclaimer: Certain member groups were not included in the original table released by SAG-AFTRA and therefore are not highlighted in this document."

Major takeaways (read this thread for more responses from a SAG-AFTRA member)

-SAG-AFTRA was able to break the DGA/WGA wage increase pattern, with a 7% raise (instead of the 5% initially offered.) Breaking pattern is a big deal, but 7% isn’t the 11% they were bargaining for.

-No new media revenue sharing plan. This was a big reason the strike even started and it's concluded with 0 gains.

-Very limited wins on AI. Actors still at immense risk of losing employment to digital replicas—a major part of why they went on strike.

-Wins on pension and health caps—this is a big deal.

-Motion capture performers are still excluded from SAG-AFTRA coverage, an unfortunate loss.

-Win on streaming bonuses—will probably only affect very few people but still a win to get their foot in the door.

-Gains for background workers is a big win.

What's happening next? -> SAG-AFTRA members are currently reviewing the contract and will start voting tomorrow (Tuesday, November 14). Voting will end the first week of December (source.)

It's still very likely that this contract ends up being ratified, especially given that 86% of national board members already voted for it prior to it being sent to members.

Keep in mind that SAG-AFTRA did succeed in opening a new revenue stream—residuals based on performance metrics—which is a huge win. And remember that the contract will be re-negotiated in 3 years, and leadership will in all likelihood build on the AI limitations built into the 2023 contract in 2026.

[ID: Destiel meme where Castiel says "I love you" and Dean says "SAG-AFTRA has reached a tentative deal to end the strike." end ID]

Full transcript of text on images below the cut.

[ID: 3 tweets from WGA West @/wgawest that say:

"99% of WGA members have voted in favor of ratifying the 2023 MBA.

We would not have been able to achieve this industry-changing contract without WGA Chief Negotiator Ellen Stutzman, Negotiating Committee Co-Chairs Chris Keyser and David A. Goodman, and the entire WGA Negotiating Committee.