美国演员工会全国委员会-美国电视和广播艺术家联合会(SAG-AFTRA)周四投票决定举行罢工工会官员说，他们召集了16万名会员去罢工。
工会的全国执行董事兼首席谈判代表邓肯·克拉布特里-爱尔兰说，全国委员会一致投票决定继续罢工。他说，工会成员将在周四午夜举行罢工，并呼吁成员们在周五早上加入纠察线。
Crabtree-Ireland表示，电影和电视制片人联盟(AMPTP)“仍然不愿意提供公平的交易”，因此SAG-AFTRA董事会决定对工作室和流媒体公司发布罢工令。
“尽管我们团队做出了努力，但AMPTP仍然坚定不移地致力于贬低我们成员的工作，”Crabtree-Ireland在谈到6月7日开始的数周谈判时表示。
SAG-AFTRA总裁法兰·德瑞雪说:“全世界的眼睛，尤其是劳工的眼睛都在看着我们。”
7月1日，在洛杉矶工会总部的新闻发布会上，SAG-AFTRA主席兼演员法兰·德瑞雪聆听全国执行董事兼首席谈判代表Duncan Crabtree-Ireland的发言...显示更多undefined
克里斯·德尔马斯/法新社
“这里发生的事情很重要，因为在我们身上发生的事情是所有劳动领域正在发生的事情，因为雇主把华尔街和贪婪作为他们的优先事项，而他们忘记了让机器运转的重要贡献者，”Drescher说。
这将是自20世纪60年代以来第一次SAG-AFTRA和拥有11，000名成员的美国编剧工会同时罢工。
“罢工肯定不是我们希望的结果，因为没有为我们的电视节目和电影带来活力的演员，工作室就无法运营，”AMPTP在一份回应工会罢工命令的声明中说。“很遗憾，工会选择了一条将导致无数依赖该行业的人陷入财务困境的道路。”
SAG-AFTRA董事会的罢工投票是在工会的谈判委员会一致投票建议罢工后进行的，预计此举将使好莱坞制作公司丧失能力，并阻碍主要夏季电影如《芭比》和《碟中谍:推算定位第一部分》的演员的宣传。
该工会的合同于太平洋时间周三晚上11点59分到期。该合同原本将于6月30日到期，但在SAG-AFTRA和AMPTP达成协议后被延长。
根据SAG-AFTRA的说法，罢工是在工会领导人和AMPTP周二同意与联邦调解人会面以达成协议，但未能在合同到期前达成协议后进行的。
SAG-AFTRA说，今年6月，98%的工会成员同意，如果不能达成协议，他们将授权罢工。
德雷舍说，她参加谈判时认为工会能够避免罢工。
“我或我们的谈判委员会，或一致投票决定继续罢工的董事会成员，都没有忽视这一行动的严重性。这是一件非常严重的事情，影响到这个国家和世界各地成千上万的人，不仅仅是这个工会的成员，还有为这个行业工作的人服务的其他行业的人，”Drescher说。“因此，我们怀着巨大的悲伤来到这个十字路口，但我们别无选择。我们是受害者。我们是一个非常贪婪的实体的受害者。”
谈判中最大的障碍是对流式残差、人工智能技术的影响和工会成员收入的担忧。
Crabtree-Ireland表示，当前的流媒体模式“削弱了表演者的剩余收入，高通胀进一步降低了我们成员的收支平衡能力。”
“让事情进一步复杂化的是，随着生殖AI(人工智能)技术的兴起，演员们现在面临着对他们生计的生存威胁，”Crabtree-Ireland说。“我们提出了解决这些问题的合同变更，但AMPTP对我们的提议不感兴趣。”
然而，AMPTP指责SAG-AFTRA退出谈判。
AMPTP在其声明中表示，它提出了一项提供“历史性薪酬”和35年来最高剩余涨幅的交易。根据声明，AMPTP还提供了更高的养老金和健康捐款上限，试镜保护，缩短系列选项期，以及“一项开创性的人工智能提案，为SAG-AFTRA成员保护演员的数字肖像。"
在宣布罢工前的一份声明中，AMPTP表示，“SAG-AFTRA没有继续谈判，而是让我们走上了一条道路，这将加深数以千计依赖该行业谋生的人的财务困境。”
周四早些时候，美国广播公司新闻母公司华特·迪士尼公司的首席执行官鲍勃·伊格尔在接受美国消费者新闻与商业频道“Squawk Box”采访时表示，编剧和演员工会的期望“不现实”
“这让我很不安。我们已经讨论了该业务的颠覆性力量以及我们面临的所有挑战，从COVID的恢复仍在进行，还没有完全恢复。这是世界上最糟糕的时刻来加剧这种混乱，”艾格说。“我理解任何劳工组织都希望代表其成员工作，以获得最多的报酬，并根据他们提供的价值获得公平的报酬。”
他补充说，“作为一个行业，我们设法与导演协会达成了一项非常好的协议，反映了导演对这一伟大事业的贡献。我们想和编剧做同样的事情，我们也想和演员做同样的事情。他们有一定程度的期望，但这并不现实。坦率地说，他们增加了这个行业已经面临的一系列挑战，这些挑战非常具有破坏性。”
伊格尔预测，SAG-AFTRA罢工，加上5月2日开始的美国作家协会罢工，“将对整个行业产生非常非常破坏性的影响。”
“不幸的是，这个行业对支持性服务的人造成了巨大的附带损害，我还可以继续下去，”艾格说。“这将影响不同地区的经济，甚至是因为企业的庞大规模。太可惜了，真的太可惜了。”
演员权益协会(Actors' Equity Association)主席凯特·辛德尔(Kate Shindle)周四下午发表声明，称她的工会成员“与罢工的SAG-AFTRA工人团结一致”。演员权益协会是一个全国性工会，代表着现场剧院的5.1万多名专业演员和舞台经理
“表演者应该分享我们为这些价值数十亿美元的全球性公司所做工作的成功，”Shindle说。“任何人都不应该站在摄像机前，担心今天的工作会在未来未经同意或补偿的情况下被挖掘、操纵或改变用途。像所有工人一样，SAG-AFTRA成员应该让雇主真诚地为一份强有力的合同讨价还价，这份合同将在快速发展的媒体中保持相关性。”
SAG-AFTRA national board orders strike
The national board of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) voted Thursday togo on strike, summoning its 160,000 members to hit the picket lines, union officials said.
The national board voted unanimously to proceed with a strike, said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, national executive director of the union and the chief negotiator. He said union members will go on strike at midnight Thursday and called on members to join picket lines Friday morning.
Crabtree-Ireland said the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) "remains unwilling to offer a fair deal," and so the SAG-AFTRA board of directors decided to issue the strike order against studios and streamers.
"Despite our team's efforts the AMPTP has remained steadfast in its commitment to devaluing the work of our members," Crabtree-Ireland said of the weeks of negotiations that began on June 7.
Fran Drescher, president of SAG-AFTRA, said "the eyes of the world and particularly the eyes of labor are upon us."
"What happens here is important because what's happening to us is what's happening across all fields of labor by means of when employers make Wall Street and greed their priority and they forget about the essential contributors that make the machine run," Drescher said.
It will be the first time since the 1960s that both SAG-AFTRA and the 11,000-member Writers Guild of America will be on strike at the same time.
"A strike is certainly not the outcome we hoped for as studios cannot operate without the performers that bring our TV shows and films to life," the AMPTP said in a statement in response to the union's strike order. "The Union has regrettably chosen a path that will lead to financial hardship for countless thousands of people who depend on the industry."
The SAG-AFTRA board of directors' strike vote came after the union's negotiating committee voted unanimously to recommend a strike in a move that is expected to incapacitate Hollywood productions and derail promotions by actors of major summer movies such as "Barbie" and "Mission Impossible: Dead Reckoning Part One."
The union's contract expired at 11:59 p.m. PT Wednesday. The contract was originally going to expire on June 30 but was extended after SAG-AFTRA and the AMPTP reached an agreement.
The labor stoppage was called after union leaders and the AMPTP agreed on Tuesday to meet with federal mediators to possibly hammer out a deal, but failed to do so before the contract expired, according to SAG-AFTRA.
In June, 98% of the union's members agreed to authorize a strike if an agreement wasn't reached, SAG-AFTRA said.
Drescher said she entered the negotiations thinking the union would be able to avert a strike.
"The gravity of this move is not lost on me or our negotiating committee, or our board members who have voted unanimously to proceed with a strike. It's a very serious thing that impacts thousands if not millions of people all across this country and around the world, not only members of this union but people who work in other industries that service the people that work in this industry," Drescher said. "And so, it came with great sadness that we came to this crossroads, but we had no choice. We are the victims here. We are being victimized by a very greedy entity."
The biggest roadblock in the negotiations are concerns over streaming residuals, the impact of AI technology, and union member earnings.
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Crabtree-Ireland said the current streaming model has "undercut performers' residual income and high inflation has further reduced our members' ability to make ends meet."
"To complicate matters further, actors now face an existential threat to their livelihoods with the rise of generative AI (artificial intelligence) technology," Crabtree-Ireland said. "We proposed contract changes that addressed these issues, but the AMPTP has been uninterested in our proposals."
The AMPTP, however, accused SAG-AFTRA of walking away from the negotiations.
In its statement, the AMPTP said it presented a deal that offered "historic pay" and the highest residual increases in 35 years. The AMPTP, according to the statement, also offered substantially higher caps on pension and health contributions, audition protections, shortened series option periods, and "a groundbreaking AI proposal that protects actors' digital likenesses for SAG-AFTRA members."
In a statement prior to the announcement of the strike, the AMPTP said, "Rather than continuing to negotiate, SAG-AFTRA has put us on a course that will deepen the financial hardship for thousands who depend on the industry for their livelihoods."
Earlier Thursday, Bob Iger, CEO of The Walt Disney Company, the parent company of ABC News, said in an interview on CNBC's "Squawk Box" that the expectations of the writers and actors' unions "are just not realistic."
"It's very disturbing to me. We've talked about disruptive forces on this business and all the challenges we're facing, the recovery from COVID, which is ongoing, it's not completely back. This is the worst time in the world to add to that disruption," Iger said. "I understand any labor organization's desire to work on behalf of its members to get the most compensation and be compensated fairly based on the value that they deliver."
He added, "We managed, as an industry, to negotiate a very good deal with the Directors Guild that reflects the value that the directors contribute to this great business. We wanted to do the same thing with the writers, and we'd like to do the same thing with the actors. There's a level of expectation that they have that is just not realistic. And they are adding to the set of the challenges that this business is already facing that is, quite frankly, very disruptive."
Iger predicted that the SAG-AFTRA strike, coupled with the Writers Guild of America strike, which began on May 2, "will have a very, very damaging effect on the whole business."
"Unfortunately, there's huge collateral damage in the industry to people who are supportive services, and I could go on and on," Iger said. "It will affect the economy of different regions, even, because of the sheer size of the business. It's a shame, it is really a shame."
Kate Shindle, president of the Actors' Equity Association, a national labor union that represents more than 51,000 professional actors and stage managers in live theater, issued a statement Thursday afternoon, saying her union members "stand in solidarity with the striking SAG-AFTRA worker."
"Performers deserve to share in the success of the work we do for these global, multibillion-dollar companies," Shindle said. "Nobody should step in front of a camera fearing that today's work will be mined, manipulated or repurposed in the future without consent or compensation. And like all workers, SAG-AFTRA members deserve to have employers bargain in good faith toward a strong contract that will remain relevant in a rapidly evolving medium."
