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Friday, October 09, 2020
SAG-AFTRA Cuts Workforce Again Due to COVID-19
Variety: SAG-AFTRA is cutting its workforce for the third time this year due to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which will leave it with about 400 employees.
Not 10 minutes ago I read an article further up about how SAG-AFTRA is employing more artists from another theatre union, Actors' Equity. To see now that the union is having to make a third employment cut to their own staff sort of puts the situation in a little bit of perspective. It's easy to think about individual workers within individual institutions and I find myself having to remember that the "chain" of workers goes all the way up. Not a single working person has been unaffected by COVID, especially between workers and the unions that represent them. Despite the worker layoffs, it's nice to read about dues relief and late fee waivers, though. I think it's important to keep as many people engaged as possible and not to lock out members behind a paywall during a time of financial struggle. I hope that theatres can bounce back soon and better than before, but we might be holding our tongue for a while.
Everyday, I read more and more about the lasting impacts this virus is having on our world and on our society. Jobs and lives together are being lost, mental health has taken a turn for the worst, virtual education is having a lifetime of impact on the young and impressionable - even once we have a vaccine, we have a lot of rebuilding to do. The fact that SAG-AFTRA feels the need to continue cutting employees, for the third time since the beginning of this economic turmoil that the virus has brought upon us, is terrifying. How much longer will the live performance industry be able to hold on to the structure that has been established for it? Or will it just kind of be diminished until the world comes back to "normal" and have to be completely rebuilt from ground up then? I am hoping that members of SAF-AFTRA are able to continue paying their dues and continue being engaged in the community.
I personally find the statistic astonishing that the Screen Actors Guild has now cut down one-third of their workers. This pandemic has hit the entertainment industry the hardest, and with broadway closing the downsizing was foreseeable- but 45 slots were much greater than I think many of us expected. However, I am interested in the fact that there seem to be so many movies and screen performances still being produced and created despite the pandemic. I suppose in a small enough cast or a properly facilitated and moderated cast there are ways to ensure the safety of those working, which is something that can't necessarily happen with live theater and live audiences. This raises the question of why television and radio artists must be cut too. If anything, they should be the survivors of the entertainment industry. Radio artists can still perform remotely from home, calling into the studio rather than being there. Even if they do decide to be in person, I feel there are ways to go around that as a mass crowd or audience is not necessary. I believe that organizations such as SAG-AFTRA should be taking more advantage of what they can do, accommodating to the pandemic rather than waiting for it to end, to keep the jobs of performers and artists secure.
What a week for SAG-AFTRA. First they are fighting over streaming rights, then they are using only SAG employees in theatre productions and forcing out Stage Managers and now they are laying off some 400 employees in their operations area. I think a lot of this nightmare could have been avoided had SAG, from the beginning, recognized that this was not going to be over quickly. There were things that they could have done from the beginning to reduce operations to save money to prevent layoffs and cuts to staffing, but it appears, based on reading the article that they did not and now they and their members are suffering as a result. This is part of the problem when you as an organization rely on dues contributions to stay alive. At any moment you could lose all of your funding. I’m not sure the senior leadership of SAG, or other unions for that matter, ever really think about the worst case scenario. Maybe it’s time to not only change leadership at these organizations, but the way they operate as whole as well.
4 comments:
Not 10 minutes ago I read an article further up about how SAG-AFTRA is employing more artists from another theatre union, Actors' Equity. To see now that the union is having to make a third employment cut to their own staff sort of puts the situation in a little bit of perspective. It's easy to think about individual workers within individual institutions and I find myself having to remember that the "chain" of workers goes all the way up. Not a single working person has been unaffected by COVID, especially between workers and the unions that represent them. Despite the worker layoffs, it's nice to read about dues relief and late fee waivers, though. I think it's important to keep as many people engaged as possible and not to lock out members behind a paywall during a time of financial struggle. I hope that theatres can bounce back soon and better than before, but we might be holding our tongue for a while.
Everyday, I read more and more about the lasting impacts this virus is having on our world and on our society. Jobs and lives together are being lost, mental health has taken a turn for the worst, virtual education is having a lifetime of impact on the young and impressionable - even once we have a vaccine, we have a lot of rebuilding to do. The fact that SAG-AFTRA feels the need to continue cutting employees, for the third time since the beginning of this economic turmoil that the virus has brought upon us, is terrifying. How much longer will the live performance industry be able to hold on to the structure that has been established for it? Or will it just kind of be diminished until the world comes back to "normal" and have to be completely rebuilt from ground up then? I am hoping that members of SAF-AFTRA are able to continue paying their dues and continue being engaged in the community.
I personally find the statistic astonishing that the Screen Actors Guild has now cut down one-third of their workers. This pandemic has hit the entertainment industry the hardest, and with broadway closing the downsizing was foreseeable- but 45 slots were much greater than I think many of us expected. However, I am interested in the fact that there seem to be so many movies and screen performances still being produced and created despite the pandemic. I suppose in a small enough cast or a properly facilitated and moderated cast there are ways to ensure the safety of those working, which is something that can't necessarily happen with live theater and live audiences. This raises the question of why television and radio artists must be cut too. If anything, they should be the survivors of the entertainment industry. Radio artists can still perform remotely from home, calling into the studio rather than being there. Even if they do decide to be in person, I feel there are ways to go around that as a mass crowd or audience is not necessary. I believe that organizations such as SAG-AFTRA should be taking more advantage of what they can do, accommodating to the pandemic rather than waiting for it to end, to keep the jobs of performers and artists secure.
What a week for SAG-AFTRA. First they are fighting over streaming rights, then they are using only SAG employees in theatre productions and forcing out Stage Managers and now they are laying off some 400 employees in their operations area. I think a lot of this nightmare could have been avoided had SAG, from the beginning, recognized that this was not going to be over quickly. There were things that they could have done from the beginning to reduce operations to save money to prevent layoffs and cuts to staffing, but it appears, based on reading the article that they did not and now they and their members are suffering as a result. This is part of the problem when you as an organization rely on dues contributions to stay alive. At any moment you could lose all of your funding. I’m not sure the senior leadership of SAG, or other unions for that matter, ever really think about the worst case scenario. Maybe it’s time to not only change leadership at these organizations, but the way they operate as whole as well.
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