Baird Steptoe Sr. Elected Head of International Cinematographers Guild, 1st Black President in its History

Baird Steptoe Sr. Elected Head of International Cinematographers Guild, 1st Black President in its History

Baird Steptoe Sr. was recently elected to a three-year term as president of the International Cinematographers Guild, according to Variety.com. Steptoe has served for some time on the guild’s national executive board and was most recently a second national vice president. Steptoe’s credits as a first assistant cameraman include Dawn of the Planet of the Apes, The Sixth Sense and Brewsters…

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There’s Power in a Union

The United Auto Workers has begun a series of targeted strikes which may expand to most or all of its 145,000 members walking off the job. The Writers Guild of America has been on strike since May, disrupting pretty much any show with a script. The strike has disrupted everything from the Emmys® to The Drew Barrymore Show. Even if the shows had scripts, who would learn the lines? The Screen…

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Disney VFX Workers Announce Intent to Hold Unionization Vote

Image: Disney Just three weeks after 52 visual effects workers at Marvel Studios announced they had filed a unionization vote with the National Labor Relations Board, 18 more internal VFX employees at Marvel parent company Disney have now also moved to form their own union, indicating a growing sea change in the demands of the historically non-union VFX industry. Variety reports that a…

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Production workers at Walt Disney Animation Studios have voted to unionize under the Animation Guild, the union announced Wednesday on X. Production coordinators, managers and supervisors at Disney Animation are poised to be represented by Local 839 IATSE, a branch of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. Sixty-three of the 68 workers who participated in the election voted in favor of union representation, according to the National Labor Relations Board. “Congratulations to the production workers at Disney Feature Animation!” the Animation Guild posted on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. “With 96% voter turnout, 93% voted yes!!! Let’s celebrate!”

SAG-AFTRA, Teamsters, IATSE, Writers Guild Issue Joint Statement in Solidarity with Directors Guild of America

May 31, 2023

Los Angeles, CA — As the Directors Guild of America’s negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) enter their final scheduled week, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE), the Teamsters, Hollywood Basic Crafts (Teamsters Local 399, IBEW Local 40, LiUNA! Local 724, OPCMIA Local 755 and UA Local 78), the Writers Guild of America East (WGAE), the Writers Guild of America West (WGAW), and the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) stand alongside our sisters, brothers, and kin in the DGA in their pursuit of a fair contract.

We believe in a Hollywood where every worker is valued and their contributions recognized, whether their labor is on or off screen. A fair contract for directors does not benefit just a select few; it uplifts every worker in the film and television industry and acknowledges the interconnected nature of our work. We call on the AMPTP to immediately negotiate a fair agreement that addresses the Directors Guild of America’s unique priorities in good faith.

As eyes around the world again turn towards the negotiation table, we send a clear message to the AMPTP: Our solidarity is not to be underestimated. The Hollywood guilds and unions stand united, and we stand strong.

In solidarity,

Matthew D. Loeb International President, IATSE

Lindsay Dougherty Motion Picture Division Director & Western Region Vice President, Teamsters Hollywood Basic Crafts, Chairperson

Duncan Crabtree-Ireland National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator, SAG-AFTRA

Michael Winship President, Writers Guild of America, East

Meredith Stiehm President, Writers Guild of America West

The oligarchs must be melting down now that workers across the country have finally decided to unionize and make the American dream possible again.

👏🎉

Workers at one of Canada's largest animation studios are looking to unionize.  Staff at WildBrain's Vancouver studio, the animation studio behind well-known animation properties such as Snoopy TV, Johnny Test and Sonic Prime, are looking to join a small but growing list of studios in the province that are part of the Canadian Animation Guild, Local 938 of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE). Hundreds of workers at WildBrain, formerly known as DHX Media Ltd., have signed union support cards, IATSE Local 938 said in a social media post. 

Continue Reading.

Tagging: @politicsofcanada

Visual effects workers for the first time in history will have union representation. On Wednesday, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) announced that Marvel VFX workers successfully passed a National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) ballot and will now join IATSE. The vote comes after a supermajority of Marvel’s internal VFX workers first signed authorization cards with the union on Aug. 7. IATSE says that because Marvel had declined voluntary recognition of the union, a vote with the NLRB was necessary. With the vote passing, it’s the first time any people who work in the visual effects space across Hollywood will have any sort of representation from a union. A simple majority of Marvel’s internal VFX staff was required in order to IATSE to represent them, but the union was of course seeking a strong number of votes to strengthen the resolve of the new branch within IATSE. The vote was 32-0 out of 41 eligible voters. 7 votes were challenged. The next step for the union is to engage in collective bargaining negotiations with Marvel to draft their first contract, or collective bargaining agreement (CBA). As of this writing, no negotiation dates have yet been scheduled.

Fuck yeah! Looks like they're organizing under IATSE (International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees)!

Actors and writers want fans to help their Hollywood strike. Here’s how.

How are strikers encouraging audiences to get involved?

SAG-AFTRA and WGA members have used social media to spread information about the strike, detailing how viewers can support entertainment workers’ demands for higher minimum pay, improved safety and more streaming residuals. Among their recommendations for aiding the strike efforts are sharing, liking and commenting on posts about the recently expired SAG-AFTRA contract because “actors are working people just like everyone else.”

“There’s a lot of misconception that our union is about stars and celebrities,” said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, SAG-AFTRA’s national executive director and chief negotiator.

Most of the guild’s 160,000 members, he said, are “working actors who are trying to make a living, pay their bills, pay their rent.”

Actors and writers are encouraging fans to join the picket line in their local area to increase strike visibility. They say people can bring signs, water and snacks to picketers. Union-allied organizations such as the Directors Guild of America, the International Brotherhood of Teamsters and the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, Moving Picture Technicians, Artists and Allied Crafts of the United States have thrown their support behind the strike effort in person and online, joining a broader coalition of unions pushing against mistreatment in the workplace.

Crabtree-Ireland said strike supporters could aid the effort by amplifying the union’s demands with social media posts and donations to fundraisers for SAG-AFTRA members. Boycotting projects made by the AMPTP is not the priority, he added.

“We’re not at this time calling for a boycott of anybody. Our focus is on shutting down production. … But that’s not to say that that won’t be something we do in the future,” he said.

How can entertainment workers receive financial support during the strike?

Several organizations have committed to supporting members of SAG-AFTRA and the WGA. Some of the most prominent funds are SAG-AFTRA’s Entertainment Community Fund and nonaffiliated crowdsourced fundraisers like the Union Solidarity Coalition Fund, Groceries for Writers and the Snacklist.

The fundraisers say they provide resources that include mental health support, health insurance, counseling, career resources, budgeting tips and grocery aid.

Fowlkes, T. 2023. "Actors and writers want fans to help their Hollywood strike. Here's how." The Washington Post, July 17. <washingtonpost.com/arts-entertainment/2023/07/17/actors-strike-what-can-fans-do/>

One of the many knock-on effects of Marvel making post-credit scenes a feature of the studio’s cinematic universe is that fans get a glimpse of just how many “below-the-line” workers it takes to make all that superhero movie magic. Production designers, hair and makeup folks, camera operators, the lists run on and on. Amongst them, usually toward the end, as theatergoers are eagerly anticipating that tease for the next MCU movie, are lists of the visual effects studios—places with names like Framestore, The Third Floor, Cinesite—that created all of those space scenes and Wakanda visuals. But unlike most of the other names in those credits, the ones attached to VFX artists have never been in a professional union.

On Monday, some folks at Marvel made a move to change that, with a supermajority of Marvel Studios’ VFX crew signing cards saying they want to be represented by the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE).

To be clear, the Marvel team is a small faction of a huge industry and doesn’t represent all those outside VFX houses that also work on MCU films. But their move marks a huge shift in Hollywood at a time when people in other industry unions—the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Screen Actors Guild—American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA)—are on strike to get better deals with the major studios. VFX workers have been talking about unionizing for more than a decade, says Bilali Mack, a VFX supervisor who has worked on everything from The Whale to The Flash. The fact that one group, albeit a small one, has taken steps to unionize is “huge,” he says.

This moment has roots in 2013, when Life of Pi won the Oscar for Best Visual Effects just as the company that worked on those effects, Rhythm & Hues, was facing bankruptcy. When the movie’s VFX supervisor, Bill Westenhofer, took the stage to accept his award he said the traditional thank yous and then added “Sadly, Rhythm & Hues is suffering severe financial difficulties right now. I urge you all to remember …”—at which point his mic was cut off and the theme from Jaws began to play.

Rhythm & Hues wasn’t the only VFX studio facing troubles. Some 21 similar companies shuttered between 2003 and 2013, due in part to production delays and the fact that many jobs were going to companies based outside the US, where tax subsidies and incentives give VFX houses a better shot at survival. Attempts to organize have been bubbling up ever since, and this week they bubbled over. “We are witnessing an unprecedented wave of solidarity that’s breaking down old barriers in the industry,” IATSE president Matthew Loeb said in a statement. “That doesn’t happen in a vacuum.”

Loeb was, of course, talking about the fact that the unionization effort at Marvel is happening amidst the SAG and WGA strikes, which may be emboldening folks in other Hollywood sectors. When the Marvel news came, I called Dave Rand. He’d worked on Life of Pi at Rhythm & Hues and had helped organize a protest outside the Oscars on the night the movie won. He agreed that the current strikes played a role but added that the VFX workers who are laid off or on hiatus amidst the strikes may be hesitant to organize because they’re worried about landing their next job. Still, he added, “it’s a step in the right direction, and it can set an example.”

Considering artificial intelligence has been a major point of contention in the Hollywood strikes so far, I asked Rand and Mack if it might be on VFX artists’ minds as well. Both agreed that it was, adding that AI can be a tool for VFX artists, but it will still always require a human to guide it. Is it possible, I asked Mack, that studios would try to create shots with AI and then have human VFX artists clean them up?

“A hundred percent,” Mack replied. “That’s a legitimate worry. Because there’s a saying in visual effects, and I think in a lot of other industries, which is that the first 90 percent takes 10 percent of your time, the last 10 percent takes 90 percent. They’re gonna spit it out, it’s gonna be a piece of crap. Then they’re just gonna be like, ‘We just want it to look perfect and feature film quality,’” and then a VFX company will get called in to spend 90 percent of their time to get paid for 10 percent of the work.

Whether that scenario plays out remains to be seen. The National Labor Relations Board still needs to do due diligence on the Marvel VFX team’s request. Only after that’s complete will all members of the eligible Marvel team be able to vote on whether they want to join the union. And only then, presumably, will it be known whether the other visual effects studios in the MCU credit sequences follow in their footsteps.

Cartoon Brew: "Walt Disney Animation Studios Remote Workers File To Unionize With The Animation Guild"

History was made this week when a group of 10 Walt Disney Animation Studios remote workers in six states filed to unionize with the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) and The Animation Guild, IATSE Local 839.

The workers requested union recognition from the studio and have filed with the National Labor Relations Board for an official unionization election.

This is the first time remote workers have attempted to unionize with TAG, and according to the union, the movement marks a significant shift in IATSE and TAG’s strategies as the organizations work to protect as many animation workers as possible.

[Read the rest here.]

Strike's over—what now?

[ID: SAG-AFTRA picket sign with the logo of a person with a raised fist and the text, "SAG-AFTRA ON STRIKE!" The picture was taken near the Sony building and "Sony Pictures" and "Sony Music Publishing" can be seen on a sign to the right. end ID]

On November 8, SAG-AFTRA reached a tentative deal with the AMPTP to end the strike. What can we as fans & audiences do to continue supporting the unions?

DONATE TO STRIKE FUNDS!

The devastating effects of both strikes on every entertainment worker AND those not in entertainment, but affected by the work stoppages, are going to continue to be felt for months, even years, down the line. PLEASE don't let up your financial support just because the strikes are over! Please keep boosting posts about how to support the unions! Tip: schedule the posts for a week or a month down the line so they keep circulating.

Entertainment Community Fund

Green Envelope Grocery Aid

VOCALLY SUPPORT THE UNIONS MOVING FORWARD!

WGA and SAG-AFTRA have won, but you know who still needs a deal? The Animation Guild will have negotiations next year. IATSE, aka International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, which represents technicians and craftspeople, is going to enter into negotiations next year. Teamsters (unionized drivers, including the ones essential to Hollywood sets!) are going into negotiations next year. It is essential that we show up for other unions like we showed up for WGA/SAG-AFTRA. And if you haven't yet... have YOU considered joining a union?

CORRECT MISINFORMATION AND BIASED NARRATIVES!

Lots of people—both in the immediate future and a few years down the line—are going to think they've drawn correct conclusions from the strike that are absolutely false. False ideas like WGA/SAG-AFTRA were the ones that dragged out the strikes, that it was unnecessary to put such a strain on the economy, and so on.

Prove them wrong—and cite your sources! WGA/SAG-AFTRA's Twitter updates and website articles updated during the strikes are a good resource, as are eyewitness accounts from those of us who were active participants in fandoms supporting the unions. Don't let the narrative get turned around. Unions are essential, strikes work, and it was the solidarity between varied workers and their audiences that forced the AMPTP back to the table.

Remember that time Trump crossed the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees picket line.

SCAB!