Skip to main content
Got a tip?
Newsletters

labor

“A Crazy, Heated Time”: SAG-AFTRA Members Debate Deal Merits Ahead of Ratification Vote

On Nov. 8, SAG-AFTRA reached a tentative deal with studios and streamers that officially brought an end to a nightmarish half a year of strikes in Hollywood. But initial jubilation among union actors soon turned to “crazy Internet infighting,” in the words of one member, over the agreement’s gains, principally the soundness of its AI […]

Adjunct Professors Launch Bid to Unionize at USC’s School of Cinematic Arts (Exclusive)

“I love the school. I bleed cardinal and gold,” says Katy Garretson. The Punky Brewster, Frasier and Fuller House director, who holds two degrees from the University of Southern California, has gotten football season tickets since she was 18 years old and even hosted a Trojan marching band at her wedding. Still, after she came […]

Pushkin Industries’ Podcast Workers Form Union

Workers at the powerhouse audio production company behind podcasts The Happiness Lab and The Dream, Pushkin Industries, have unionized after management voluntarily recognized their bargaining unit. A group of producers, editors and engineers are joining the Writers Guild of America East after a card check conducted by a third party found that the majority of […]

Hotel Union Gears Up to Picket Major Hollywood Awards Ceremonies

Unite Here Local 11, the major hospitality union that is currently in a labor dispute with dozens of hotels in the Los Angeles area, is gearing up to picket major entertainment awards shows set to take place at these venues if their settings do not change. Among the events that could see picket lines at […]

Actors’ AI Protections Are a Step Forward, But There’s Reason to Worry

Of the 16-page summary detailing the tentative deal between SAG-AFTRA and the studios, more than five are spent on provisions over artificial intelligence. It’s the product of months of hard-nosed bargaining by the union on an issue that the studios seemingly didn’t think would emerge as a sticking point walking into negotiations. The document cites […]

How SAG-AFTRA’s Streaming Bonus Compares to Other Guild Deals

Actors will get a somewhat larger piece of the streaming pie under the tentative agreement they made with studios and streamers — and the deal has a wrinkle that sets it apart from other recent contracts between Hollywood guilds and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. Under the proposed new contract, which SAG-AFTRA’s […]

Inside the Battle Over Fran Drescher’s “Robin Hood Fund”

In the final days of the SAG-AFTRA contract negotiations, when pressure was closing in on the guild to end what had been a crippling, nearly six month work stoppage, union president Fran Drescher was holding onto an unusual demand, one that most guild members knew nothing about.  Drescher wanted a fund over which SAG had […]

SAG-AFTRA Board Approves New Contract

SAG-AFTRA’s national board has approved the tentative agreement between the actors union and studios and streamers that ended the 118-day actors strike. The board voted to accept the deal with 86 percent approval, national executive director Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said at a press conference Friday. Members of the 160,000-strong union will vote on ratification of the […]

Can SAG-AFTRA’s Success Inspire Actors Unions Worldwide?

Speaking to CNN on Thursday, shortly after SAG-AFTRA announced it had made its historic deal ending the actors strike, SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher told CNN Anchor Kate Bolduan the union’s success had “ignited a workers movement around the world.” Reports of the 118-day walkout were headline news from Spain to Seoul and from London, Ontario […]

“It’s a Dead End”: TV Writers Assistants Lose Hope for Post-Strike Career Advancement

Although landing any Hollywood gig will always be a challenge, those who work as writers assistants and in other support staff roles within the television-writing ecosystem have found this moment particularly dire. The writers strike is over, and rooms for broadcast hits have reopened, but few jobs in this space have surfaced since then, and […]

Fran Drescher: “Meryl Streep Said to Me, ‘This Is Great, Now Go Run for President’”

With the SAG-AFTRA strike in the rearview, Fran Drescher will soon have more time on her hands to consider career moves outside of union negotiations. But she knows for sure one job she doesn’t want. “Meryl Streep said to me, ‘This is great, now go run for president,’” the president of Hollywood’s largest union recounts […]

Duncan Crabtree-Ireland Postgames SAG-AFTRA Deal: We Fought for “Journeyman Performer”

On Thursday morning, SAG-AFTRA finally ended the 118-day actors strike after its negotiating committee approved a tentative agreement with Hollywood studios valued at over $1 billion. Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the union’s national executive director and chief negotiator, knows the process to get to this point was lengthy and brutal — but he says it was necessary […]