Hollywood Labour Dispute and Strikes

[spinynorman]

Hollywood actors have gone on strike as of 14 July 2023, joining the Writers Guild, who have been on strike since 2 May. It is the first time since 1960 that writers and actors have been on strike jointly.

One of the big issues in the strike is a Disney proposal involving AI that includes scanning a background actor’s likeness for one day’s worth of pay and using their likeness forever in any form without any pay or consent.

Another concern (and the main concern for the writers) is around the residuals from streaming media and the lack of transparency around viewing numbers on them.

As part of the strike, actors are no longer engaging in film and television productions and cannot take part in promotional events such as press junkets and premieres.

Studio executives are threatening to pull films from the big festivals of the next couple of months such as Venice and Telluride, let alone the knock on effects of films that haven't yet finished filming.

We'll almost certainly start noticing the effects of this in the next few months. Actors and writers see this as an existential fight for their livelihoods and craft, the studios see this as an opportunity to break their heavily unionised workforce.

Solidarity to the actors and writers.

 

[WaynesWorld19]

I find this story absolutely intruiging .....given the changes occurring in Hollywood with AI and streaming residuals

 

[BlakeyNoFlakey]

The threat of AI is starting to bite in the entertainment industry. AI used for writing scripts and to generate actors in films. This is an important battle for all those involved. The corporations like Disney are seeing AI as a way of cutting costs and increasing profits from their products. I hope for the future of all those in this industry that they succeed in making the studios only use AI in a very limited way.

 

[WaynesWorld19]

The threat of AI is starting to bite in the entertainment industries. AI used for writing scripts and to generate actors in films. This is an important battle for all those involved in these industries.

Fancy being an actor & paid for one days work, having your body scanned .....and then losing the rights & income from that scanned image in perpetuity

 

[BlakeyNoFlakey]

Fancy being an actor & paid for one days work, having your body scanned .....and then losing the rights & income from that scanned image in perpetuity

It's disgraceful. It's exploitation.

 

[Gralin]

Fancy being an actor & paid for one days work, having your body scanned .....and then losing the rights & income from that scanned image in perpetuity

One of the flash cameos was an actor from the tv series who didn't even know they were a cameo until the movie came out.

They didn't film, they weren't asked and you can guarantee they weren't paid for it

 

[Gralin]

 

[Gralin]

More and more *ery is going to come out.



Imagine having to deal with this sort of s**t

 

[rank and file]

More and more *ery is going to come out.le



Imagine having to deal with this sort of s**t

Lol Hollywood simp
"People ask why I haven't done created another show."
Most likely got booted from the Writers Guild.

Nobody cares.
Bloated industry where bloated egos are being replaced by AI.

 

[Gasometer]

Random thoughts

1.I am fully on the Union side

2.but I know what the streamers will do and that will be up prices

3.Netflix is already ridiculous when you consider the drop off in quality

4.I suspect viewers will cancel the multiple subscriptions

5.The last writers strike impacted shows that I was invested in at the time

6.At least we might get longer episodes of Survivor

 

[Gralin]

Lol Hollywood simp
"People ask why I haven't done created another show."
Most likely got booted from the Writers Guild.

Nobody cares.
Bloated industry where bloated egos are being replaced by AI.

What?

 

[rank and file]

What?

2023 and the two weakest unions in the world are from Hollywood.

 

[Gralin]

2023 and the two weakest unions in the world are from Hollywood.

What?

 

[JackOutback]

I find this story absolutely intruiging .....given the changes occurring in Hollywood with AI and streaming residuals

I agree; Susan Sarandon was right in saying they are in an old contract for a new type of business and it's not working for a lot of people.

What's being lost a little in the argument is the reason streamers are losing money and crying poor is because every bloody studio saw Netflix achieve success, wanted a piece of that pie and pulled their work to create their own. Netflix was a success because it was like a library of content in one place, having separate streamers for all the studios broke the system. They have been spending billions to try and win the streaming wars; they got greedy and want the actors and writers to pay for it.

Not every studio needs a streamer. Oh, and not every movie needs to cost $200m.

 

[Gralin]

I agree; Susan Sarandon was right in saying they are in an old contract for a new type of business and it's not working for a lot of people.

What's being lost a little in the argument is the reason streamers are losing money and crying poor is because every bloody studio saw Netflix achieve success, wanted a piece of that pie and pulled their work to create their own. Netflix was a success because it was like a library of content in one place, having separate streamers for all the studios broke the system. They have been spending billions to try and win the streaming wars; they got greedy and want the actors and writers to pay for it.

Not every studio needs a streamer. Oh, and not every movie needs to cost $200m.

The current model gives streaming sites 30 days of no residuals, its why they encourage binging

It's also in part why they are now removing shows without warning.

Apart from the tax write off element it puts a sense of FOMO in their users who if they don't quit the platform are more likely to watch stuff in the first 30 days.

Add to that the way they pay residuals for streaming vs traditional viewing is significantly worse for the writers and actors for some unknown reason (greed)

The reason these strikes are happening isn't for the writers or actors at the top of the food chain.

its for the vast majority of members of both unions that need day jobs to pay the bills who are now getting even less income from their art than ever

meanwhile the studio execs are getting more money than ever before

its the kind of situation most of us should be able to relate to if we get past the idea that seeing someone on tv means they are rich

 

[WaynesWorld19]

I agree; Susan Sarandon was right in saying they are in an old contract for a new type of business and it's not working for a lot of people.

What's being lost a little in the argument is the reason streamers are losing money and crying poor is because every bloody studio saw Netflix achieve success, wanted a piece of that pie and pulled their work to create their own. Netflix was a success because it was like a library of content in one place, having separate streamers for all the studios broke the system. They have been spending billions to try and win the streaming wars; they got greedy and want the actors and writers to pay for it.

Not every studio needs a streamer. Oh, and not every movie needs to cost $200m.

Ego's and fear of loss of revenue drove each of the studios ......the issue is, to have a wide range of movie / TV show selections, you need to have 3-4 apps ....and you can't do that if the subscription price goes up

So the studio's / Netflix are doing two things ......driving the price of the product down via actor / writer salaries / residuals .....spending less on production of their movies / shows .....and adding advertising

Both in the video market, and now in the phone market .....once you got to market saturation, you started getting rationalisation of outlets

Of course the same will occur in streaming as well ......currently everyone is beating their chest & playing chicken ......underpaying actors / writers is not a solution .....it's a stop gap to the eventual rationalisation

I've even seen some correspondence to the effect, studio's would make more money, by going back to licensing movies / shows to studio's

 

[JackOutback]

Both very good analyses above.

The removal of programs from streaming services that they produced/own is a bugbear of mine. Again, the appeal of streaming services is that the content is always available to watch at any time. Taking away content for any other reason than licensing should not be on. Taking shows away, adding commercials, simply turns streamers into commercial TV without the set timeslots.

Anyways, I think studios expected the actors to blink first, but when Disney has to start pushing back release dates for its Marvel slate, the return of Star Wars movies, Avatar's schedule gets threatened etc, I predict they will blink first. Which will be a good result.

 

[Gralin]

The issue is wider than just streaming though.

There are only a few big players left in the industry to begin with, Disney is now so massive that their actions impact on everyone.

And they're moving to a model where as much as possible they are killing off the unions and old industry skills

if you look at how they make big budget movies now with digital cameras you get s**t like this



No set, minimal props, mostly stand in props

using digital artists to fill out most of it

they do this for a few reasons

digital effects isn't unionised the way the traditional industry jobs are

less skills required, easier to change, say someone doesn't like the look of the gun or the furniture in the background

or they get paid for product placement, they can change that stuff in the computer, no reshoots, much cheaper

plus less power to the unions on set because less of the jobs are skilled union jobs

s**t they don't even need actors filming together half the time, this seen they shot Jackson and Evans in different physical locations on different days and made it look like they were in the same room having a conversation

Disney has also been doing makeup in post production, we've seen digital versions of actors in cameos, not just things like dead or "young" versions but just, eh we've got that guys face chuck him in.

now they're scanning in actors, the smaller ones especially, bit parts all that sort of stuff and owning the rights to use them whenever they want without paying

they're using AI for the opening credits on Secret Invasion so not even paying VFX artists

you can see they want to get to the point where they do it all in computer with prompts, without people as much as possible to keep the most money in their own pockets

everyone was talking about repetitive manual jobs, switchboard etc being automated out of existence, but they're going for everything they can

the entire arts is at risk for corporate greed

 

[Gralin]

Both very good analyses above.

The removal of programs from streaming services that they produced/own is a bugbear of mine. Again, they appeal of streaming services is that the content is always available to watch at any time. Taking away content for any other reason than licensing should not be on. Taking shows away, adding commercials, simply turn streamers into commercial TV without the set timeslots.

Anyways, I think studios expected the actors to blink first, but when Disney has to start pushing back release dates for its Marvel slate, the return of Star Wars movies, Avatar's schedule gets threatened etc, I predict they will blink first. Which will be a good result.

Disney killed a few original shows after a year
Paramount just killed a star trek show and as part of that removed the existing seasons

a week or two ago an original disney movie was deleted after less than 2 months

they're putting crazy budgets on these things, they writing them off to not pay tax on the stuff they make real money on it seems

 

[WaynesWorld19]

The issue is wider than just streaming though.

There are only a few big players left in the industry to begin with, Disney is now so massive that their actions impact on everyone.

And they're moving to a model where as much as possible they are killing off the unions and old industry skills

if you look at how they make big budget movies now with digital cameras you get s**t like this

View attachment 1741303

No set, minimal props, mostly stand in props

using digital artists to fill out most of it

they do this for a few reasons

digital effects isn't unionised the way the traditional industry jobs are

less skills required, easier to change, say someone doesn't like the look of the gun or the furniture in the background

or they get paid for product placement, they can change that stuff in the computer, no reshoots, much cheaper

plus less power to the unions on set because less of the jobs are skilled union jobs

s**t they don't even need actors filming together half the time, this seen they shot Jackson and Evans in different physical locations on different days and made it look like they were in the same room having a conversation

Disney has also been doing makeup in post production, we've seen digital versions of actors in cameos, not just things like dead or "young" versions but just, eh we've got that guys face chuck him in.

now they're scanning in actors, the smaller ones especially, bit parts all that sort of stuff and owning the rights to use them whenever they want without paying

they're using AI for the opening credits on Secret Invasion so not even paying VFX artists

you can see they want to get to the point where they do it all in computer with prompts, without people as much as possible to keep the most money in their own pockets

everyone was talking about repetitive manual jobs, switchboard etc being automated out of existence, but they're going for everything they can

the entire arts is at risk for corporate greed

I'm a movie devotee ....going back to movies in the 1930's

The picture quality of movies from the 40's, 50's & 50's have stood up fabulously ......in the 70's the studio's sought cheaper stock, and the quality is awful

This is just my opinion .....once we got to digital & 4K quality, it appears there was too much detail & showed actors skin abnormalities ......so I find movies / shows now have the Doris Day Filters applied .....they call is fashionable for movies not to be as sharp as "reality TV" ........we know that's BS

 

[Gralin]

"trimmed the trees boss"

 

[WaynesWorld19]

"trimmed the trees boss"

tweet has disappeared ?

 

[Gralin]

tweet has disappeared ?

still showing for me, twitter is ****ed these days though

 

[Gralin]

people are talking about these being public trees out on the street, not on the lot so not owned by the studios

 

[Big_Luch]

The regrowth on those trees would suggest they cut them well before the strike.