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UPDATE 9:17 p.m.: The following was sent to SAG-AFTRA members this evening:
“The Negotiating Committee was on standby today, awaiting a response from the AMPTP to both the AI counter-proposal we presented yesterday and the comprehensive counter-proposal we tabled five days ago,” one said Statement from the Television/Cinema Negotiating Committee.
“Our team looks forward to further negotiating with the companies tomorrow,” the statement ended.
PREVIOUS EXCLUSIVE: All was quiet on the SAG-AFTRA negotiating front Thursday.
After rumors in recent days that a deal between SAG-AFTRA and AMPTP was all but done, today was “more of a waiting game,” according to an insider. After Wednesday’s high-level back-and-forth over AI protections and more, studios were pretty quiet on this 112th day of the actors’ strike.
Although the two sides were expected to talk today, the AMPTP has not responded to the revised AI proposal the guild submitted on Wednesday. Nor, we hear, has it responded to SAG-AFTRA’s self-described “comprehensive counterproposal” put forth on Oct. 28. As a result, no formal talks took place today between the Guild’s chief negotiator, Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, and AMPTP President Carol Lombardini.
Still, a week and a half into this latest round of renewed deliberations, sources on both sides remain optimistic and caution against reading too much into today’s non-talks. “I would be worried if they contacted us in a few hours then I would think they wouldn’t take it [the proposals] seriously,” a guild source told Deadline. “This is how it should work if we want to get a good and fair deal.”
There is no information on whether further talks have been agreed, but the AMPTP is expected to respond “soon,” an industry veteran said, which will determine the timeline.
On another track, although nothing is final, according to a studio source, it appears that both sides may have reached “a comfortable point” when it comes to artists’ financial share of streaming revenue, although details are still scarce gives.
As has been custom since the parties resumed discussions in person and virtually on October 24, neither SAG-AFTRA nor AMPTP responded to Deadline’s requests for comment today. If this is the case, we will update this post.
SAG-AFTRA
In the streets today, the picket line was closed at Fox and remained suspended at Universal, but guild members marched at Netflix, Sony, Disney, Paramount, Warner Bros. Discovery and Amazon. Crabtree-Ireland showed up at Amazon’s Culver City headquarters mid-morning to skip the line.
With the WGA going on strike in early May and SAG-AFTRA demonstrating in mid-July, the labor disputes are estimated to have cost the California economy more than $6.5 billion so far and 45,000 entertainment jobs, many of which working families have seen for six No steady paycheck for months.
Paramount Global CFO Naveen Chopra said on the company’s earnings call today that the financial impact of the strikes on the company amounts to “nearly $60 million in strike-related shutdown costs.” These are additional costs that arise to maintain production capacity during the strike. These costs impacted both our TV media and filmed entertainment segments.”
On the same call, Paramount Global CEO Bob Bakish further explained the impact of the strikes on the company, adding: “As you have seen, we have recently made some changes to our film programming that has been impacted by the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike “And while late night is back on, the scripted side of television is still affected by strikes.”
“Of course we all hope to be able to go back to work soon,” he said.
Despite being frequently briefed, the head of Paramount Global was not directly involved in the negotiations last week.
The core “Gang of Four” CEOs who attended last week – NBCUniversal’s Donna Langley, Warner Bros Discovery’s David Zaslav, Netflix’s Ted Sarandos and Disney’s Bob Iger – have not been part of the talks in recent days, Crabtree- Ireland and Lombardini took the lead. It remains to be seen whether the CEOs will return to the talks at a later date, as they will be briefed by their legal teams who are taking the lead. However, Langley, Zaslav, Sarandos and Iger remain available for any last-minute Zooms and meetings, we’re told.
Studios are plagued by fears and are eager to ramp up feature film and television production, particularly on films that were halted mid-production, including Deadpool 3, Mission: Impossible 8 and Gladiator 2. While the remaining two With a limited number of filming days available in 2023 with months of holidays, there is still work that can be done to ensure some tentpoles reach their theatrical release dates in 2024. The filmmakers are already in the cutting room, cutting everything and preparing before the IATSE talks begin next year.
One thing is certain, all sides tell us: The progress that writers and players have made in doing business will lay the foundation for next year’s IATSE and Teamsters talks.
Both IATSE and the Teamsters were frequent and vocal supporters of the WGA and SAG-AFTRA and emphasized union solidarity. And from guilds to studios to streamers to individuals, everyone is worried about what AI could mean for them and the industry
Crabtree-Ireland told Deadline at New York Comic-Con last month that when it comes to AI, “the kind of guardrails we want to build around this technology are not dependent on the evolution of the technology,” among SAG’s goals -AFTRA he added: “The idea that an artist has the right to informed consent to use their image and likeness in the creation of a digital replica – every artist should have that right in every form of technology, including AI and AI tools designed for this purpose.”
“So I think the guardrails that we put around fair compensation and informed consent are things that can grow with the industry and the state of technology,” Crabtree-Ireland said.
As much as top talent is protected, it is also important for SAG-AFTRA to ensure that extras and actors also have AI rights in contracts with the studios at the end of the call sheet. A specific demand that the guild returns to again and again is that the likeness of its members must not be reproduced an infinite number of times without appropriate compensation. Currently, the guild’s core idea is for AI to be used and paid for on a project-by-project basis to prevent abuse and maintain the practice as a viable profession for the vast majority of SAG-AFTRA’s 160,000 members.