Actors' Equity Association Asserts Itself In SAG-AFTRA Disagreement

Actors' Equity has accused SAG-AFTRA, the union representing film, television and radio artists, of encroaching on its territory by negotiating lower paying contracts with Equity theaters for streaming productions.

SAG-AFTRA has made deals for at least 60 productions with theaters that have pivoted to streaming in lieu of their usual live productions.

In addition to lower pay rates for actors, contracts negotiated through SAG-AFTRA do not count toward Equity healthcare or pensions. Equity estimates that actors have lost $600,000 in earnings as $150,000 in employer contributions to the Equity-League Health Fund as a result of lost contracts.

Last week, the already ailing fund went public with its decision to up the number of weeks members must work in order to qualify for healthcare, making those losses particularly significant.

SAG-AFTRA contracts also often eliminate stage managers, who are also represented by Equity. A group of union stage managers recently began sharing a petition calling on SAG-AFTRA to cease the practice.

They write, "Many of us could qualify for health insurance or maintain our coverage this year if we could earn weeks working for Actors' Equity bargaining partners during the pandemic. You have unilaterally taken this opportunity away from both stage managers and actors. And in some cases, you have cost stage managers our jobs. A number of stage managers had confirmed work under Equity contracts, and when the projects were moved to a SAG-AFTRA agreement, we were let go, losing those wages and expected benefit accrual. At best, we are forced to work without the benefit of a contract and have no union protections or benefits for these jobs. For a union to take away union members' ability to work and obtain benefits--especially health insurance--during a pandemic is shocking and disheartening."

Mary McColl, Equity's executive director said, "We're in the middle of the worst crisis facing the American theater since the flu of 1918, and why would now be the time to change our decades-long relationship of working together? It doesn't help actors and stage managers, and it doesn't help the labor movement. We should be fighting to protect the workers, and instead we're in this argument about whose fence should be where."