CULVER CITY, CALIFORNIA Isis King demonstrated in Hollywood on Friday of last week. King is an actor and has appeared in the TV series Huippumalli hau and L-koodi.
He marched with other striking entertainment workers in Los Angeles in front of studios and streaming service companies.
The slogans were refreshing.
– There are many actors here who earn mere cents. Everyone should get a living wage, King said.
The past summer has been an exceptional strike summer in Hollywood.
The Screen Actors Guild (SAG-AFTRA) went on strike in mid-July. The Writers Guild of America (WGA) started its strike already in May.
Actors and screenwriters are fighting for higher fees. They also want better compensation for reruns from streaming services and protection against the threat posed by artificial intelligence.
Even Tom Cruise participated in the negotiations. That didn’t help either.
Employers’ Union says he offered salary increases for actors for a total of one billion dollars. It also promised to pay a portion of pension fund and health insurance premiums and to protect workers against artificial intelligence.
The workers rejected the offer. According to them, the increase in prices weaken offered salary increases so much that the performers would earn even less than in 2020.
The actors’ union includes 160,000 performers across the United States. Only a fraction of the actors are Hollywood superstars. Tom Cruise, Matt Damon and appearing in the recent Barbie movie Margot Robbie make millions, but a large proportion of unionized actors struggle to make ends meet.
About actors belonging to the union almost 90 percent deserves under $26,000 per year, and with this income they don’t even get health insurance from their union.
A single-person household is considered low-income in Los Angeles if annual earnings are less than $70,700.
Living in uncertainty
King is concerned about studios’ efforts to use and utilize artificial intelligence in their future productions. Digital versions of the actors could be made and made to say and do anything – without separate compensation.
Many of the actors who rise to fame are “discovered” when they work as background actors, for example in crowd scenes or as customers in a cafe.
That’s how King began his career. Now he fears that studios will “duplicate” Actors at the beginning of their careers and later make a profit with their success.
– No one can have a lifetime license to use my face, my performance or any character created based on it for their own purposes, emphasized King.
Actors live in uncertainty. King hasn’t worked all year, despite being a regular on Amazon’s With Love series.
– I don’t know about the continuation of the series. It can be terminated at any time.
Artificial intelligence also scares screenwriters
The situation for screenwriters is no better. 20,000 of them belong to the union of their own field.
Strike guard Hannah Murphy leading protesting screenwriters through the main gate of Sony’s studios. Before the strike, he wrote a TV series that will start in the fall.
– Production periods are getting shorter all the time. We are used to the time of grace, but there is more and more of it all the time. We are not paid anything between seasons. We also don’t get paid for reruns of streaming services or overtime, although we may sometimes write until 3 in the morning.
Murphy says he earned better in his previous job as an assistant than as a screenwriter for movies and TV series.
– Most of my colleagues here write advertising texts as a side job, just like me.
He hopes to get by with his main job.
– I want to work all year round, but fewer writers are hired all the time, says Murphy.
Murphy finds artificial intelligence scary.
– That is one of the reasons why we are on strike. People watch TV for human stories. Series and movies based on true events captivate viewers.
Studios don’t understand this if they want to use ChatGPT and other AI programs to create content, says Murphy.
Studios are currently hiring creators of artificial intelligence projects in their ranks. Salary offer from streaming giant Netflix for leaders of artificial intelligence software development is $300,000 to $900,000.
Wide support for the strike
Cars passing by are honking their horns to show their support for the strikers waving signs. It’s hot, the average July temperature in Los Angeles was 29 degrees.
The hotel industry has also gone on strike in California this summer.
King says everyone wants fairer working conditions.
– It’s not just about the actors, it’s about how huge sums the company managers earn and how little the actual workers get paid.
For example, Disney’s studio boss Bob Iger received criticism after saying that the actors’ demands were unreasonable.
– He Earns $78,000 per day with our help. How can you even have a conversation with such a blind person, raged the president of the actors’ union Fran Drescher in a live interview in mid-July.
Including bonuses and stock options, Iger’s earnings may increase to 31 million dollars per year.
The strike affects almost every employee in the film and television industry. Many have had to come up with new sources of income during the strike.
The writers will meet today, Friday, with a representative of the studios and streaming services. However, few believe that the strike will end yet.
The most important award ceremony in the television industry of the year, the Emmy gala, has already been moved from September to the future.
The topic can be discussed until Saturday, August 5. until 11 p.m.