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Unions Urging Actors Not To Work On Hobbit Movie
lbalbalba writes "Last we heard about The Hobbit, Guillermo Del Toro dropped out, Peter Jackson was unofficially directing and secretly auditioning actors, the movie had yet to be green-lit, and Ian McKellen was getting super-antsy about the whole thing and threatening not to play Gandalf. This shouldn't help the long-gestating movie happen any quicker: Actors guilds including SAG issued actual alerts yesterday against working on any of the Hobbit films, advising their members not to take parts in the non-union production, should they be offered them."
They have some really stupid restrictions. Take Sin City for example. Frank Miller was very unwilling to have any more of his work turned in to a movie, because he'd been badly screwed over by Hollywood. Robert Rodriguez figured he would win Miller over and in fact did. So they started work on the movie. Rodriguez felt that Miller did so much in directing the film that he was an equal, not an assistant director, but another director. However the Director's Guild doesn't allow that. All films have one and only one director. There can be assistants, but only one director. In the end, Rodriguez left the DGA so that Miller could have director credit. Because of that, he lost his position as director on another film.
The guilds in Hollywood are in every way as corrupt and stupid as the studios themselves.
You often dont have an option to not join. For example, try being a non-union actor. No one will hire you because the union says their members cant work on films with non-union actors.
"Have you ever thought about just turning off the TV, sitting down with your kids, and hitting them?"
The SAG is different from most labor unions in that they represent workers who are paid for creative output rather than pure labor. It is in an actor's best interest not to slack off and put in a mediocre performance because their future employment prospects are dependent on their portfolio of (hopefully quality) work. This isn't how things work out in unions representing menial laborers.
There was a recent Daily Show where the UFCW was picketing a Wal-Mart for their anti-union practices. The catch is that the picketers were non-union temp workers paid minimum wage to represent the union's cause without any of the benefits. They even had their hours reduced because the union member who supplied the signs had limited time available. This is the sort of bullshit most unions create. They are just out to justify their own existence and keep their members secure in the knowledge that they are protected for slacking off and obstructing efficiency.
Collective bargaining is a powerful tool to uplift the exploited, but as with all forms of power it is all to easily abused and usually is.
I am becoming gerund, destroyer of verbs.
In some cases, the unions simply have enough force. Part of their "collective bargaining" is to bargain that nobody gets to hire non-union employees. So even though there may be no real legal prevention, there is effective prevention. Join or you get no work in that field. In other places, there is legal protection. In non "right to work" states if a given field is unionized, membership is non-optional. You work in that field, you MUST join the union by law. You get situations like where the UAW is forcing independent daycare providers to pay dues. See the UAW represents daycare workers in that state, and membership is non-optional. So they are forcing it even on people who are working for themselves, and thus a situation where a union has no relevance. See: http://current.com/news/92664102_day-care-workers-are-now-uaw-workers.htm.
All of this is just the legal reasons who joining unions is often non-optional. There are also less savory cases of intimidation and violence.
They also work hard to keep it that way. For example right now there's a measure coming up on the ballot here to force all union votes to be secret ballot. Just like actual election votes, and most other votes, the identity of people voting would be protected, you wouldn't know who voted what way. The unions are fighting it extremely hard. Now why would they do that? What reason is there to not want a secret ballot? That system is well established.
The reason, of course, is pressure. If you know how people voted, you can pressure them to vote the way you want. That's the whole reason we use secret ballots in political elections is so that can't happen. However the unions are concerned if it happened, people could vote to disband the union and they'd not be able to pressure them out of it.
If it was just as simple as "Don't join if you don't wanna," it wouldn't be nearly such a big deal. However it isn't.
Some states allow for that kind of thing. "Right to work states," have less employee protections in general (you are usually at will) but also less union protection. You can work a job that has a union, but not be a member and all that. However a number of states, in particular those with big unions with lots of power, are not that way. You are required to join the union that represents you, like it or no, if you work in a given field.
In some cases it is technically legal not to be a member but impossible as a practicality because the union forces places not to hire non-union workers.
This is part of the reason why you see so much ill will towards unions from some in the US. Many of them, in particular the larger ones, have a "Our way or the highway," situation. If you work in an industry they control, you have to be a member and play by their rules. That leaves a bad taste in the mouths of many.
But actually, the theatre and broadcasting unions, by virtue of the fact that they'll use their power to walk out if someone hires non-union staff create the equivalent of a closed shop. Try and get a job on the West End stage without an Equity card.
Of course, the effect of unions in the US is that a lot of productions are done elsewhere. Tarantino shot most of Kill Bill in China. The crew worked 6 days a week rather then 5 (so production could be quicker) and the crew cost was about half of the US.
I am an AEA member (the stage actor's union) which means I can join SAG if I want. But my point is the same for both unions.
We do not need more collective bargaining. Both SAG and AEA spend a truckload on things like lobbying for health care. You should have seen our newsletters when congress was debating it -- first it was 'call your congressman and support this bill!' And then when it seemed like the 'Cadillac' plans would be taxed, it was 'call your congressman and fight this bill!'
As a professional actor you do not have a choice when it comes to joining the unions. If you just act on the side then there are plenty of non-union stage jobs at dinner theaters and that sort of thing, and some professional tours every now and then (though the unions have pretty much successfully unionized these). When I got my first professional stage job, I forked over about 1/5 of what I was going to make over the 4 months of the tour for the $1400 initiation fee (and then paid a couple percentage points out of my pay check each week). You can't choose not to do it.
Having said that, the acting unions, like most unions, perform a number of great functions. Before they existed, you couldn't make a respectable living as an actor -- now you can but it's just very hard (which is probably always going to be the case). There are lots of really helpful people who do things like go over all the time sheets because your stage manager didn't keep track of the hours you spent driving / assembling the show / acting the show, and you get a check in the mail 3 months after the fact because your union is looking out for you. They also help you with taxes and do a lot of fairly simple 'here's how the business works' type programs for new actors.
But like most unions, they never ever give anything up that they've won in past negotiations. Before, the producers controlled the business; now the unions do, though of course they wouldn't put it that way. What's happened is that there's now a huge divide between the very small (99 or fewer) seat theaters and the 'professional' ones where they have to do everything according to union rules -- that means actor's union, the electricians' union, the stagehands' union ... because the unions stick together and if you get one on board, then you get 'em all. It's very, very difficult to make money running a theater, and as a consequence most bigger theaters won't produce anything unless it's a big hit show. So lots of fad musicals and less original drama. To some extent that's how the business would be anyway, union or not, but it's exacerbated by how expensive running an AEA theater is.
Compared to groups like the SEIU, the entertainment unions are pretty tame, and as I hope I've made clear, I'm grateful for what my union has done for me -- but if I could, I'd tear them all apart and start from scratch, because we have the same big, bloated, self-serving unions just grabbing for the biggest piece of pie they can (an actual headline from Equity News last year: 'How AEA Will Get a Piece of the Stimulus Pie,' as if actors needed federal stimulus money!) in the same fashion that big business used to do it before the unions. No union leader stops and asks 'just because I CAN do this or demand that, should I?'
It's all just a matter of degrees.
The last place I worked was a "union shop" - Oak Ridage National Labs. So, let me tell you why I have an obviously irrational dislike of unions.
So, you have an Ethernet card go bad (back when they were not integrated into the mother boards). You had to deal with the Teamsters, Electricians, and the carpenters to get it changed. Only the teamsters can move things. Typically speaking your computer isn't where everything can be taken off so if that monitor needs moved or the box needs moved around to get access to it then you have the have the teamsters do it. Next only electricians are allowed to plug/unplug wires and you cards. Lastly carpenters are the only ones that can take a screw out or put it in. Further you always get a minimum of two workers at a minimum of an hour each. You can't schedule them all at one time (after all they are busy people and no one knows when they will get to you) so you have to do each one, wait until the finish, and schedule another. If you are a high enough in the corporate hierarchy you can get several at a time - but it costs you.
So, now back to the dead card - you need to first call the teamsters in to move your monitor and/or box. Next the electricians have to come over and unplug the unit. Then you get the carpenters to come out to take the screws out of the back of the machine. Now back to the teamsters to take the case off (it is moving it). Then the carpenters come back out and take the screws out that are holding you card in place. Then the electricians have to back called in to change the card out. Now we do the whole things in reverse - carpenters to put the screws back in, teamsters to put the case back on, carpenters to put those screws in, electricians to plug the computer back up, and the teamsters to move it back into place.
If you violate any of that and do it yourself (and get caught) it is one of only two things that are immediate termination (the other - for reasons beyond me - were to sleep while on the premises no matter how long you had been there). And people *did* get fired over it - even full staff scientists got removed for it from time to time. Indeed, you *would* (not could) get a grievance filed for simply having a screwdriver (leathermans were a touchy subject too), and that pretty much always resulted in a hefty fine to your project.
There are some ways around it - for example service contracts with outside companies for equipment, those outside companies get to service their own equipment - but do that in more than just a few cases and the unions will not only be ultra strict but will also take days to get to any request you have (as I said they are busy people so one can't expect them to be at your beck and call). The other is to realize that they are also strict about their working hours - so wait until they go home, close your door and lock it, and replace the part yourself. However you can't do the latter if you do not know how (for example the secretaries rarely know how to tear a computer apart and no one asks someone else to do something that could potentially get both people fired), if the part is tagged as inventory and tracked by their asset management software, or if you are unlucky enough to be in an open space that can't be closed and locked.
I'm going to assume that you do not find the above "sane" - I certainly didn't. Lots of good science goes on there despite a great deal of that type of crap (most simply risk their jobs, we all certainly did). If you *do* find that sane then I'm actually offended that you may find me "otherwise sane". Unions in the US have spiraled out of control over the last few decades. Having never worked in the UK I can't say how it is there - I can say the above isn't that strange for unionized labor pools in the US and there are quite a few places that are worse. If the people are "otherwise sane" then it may behoove you to *ask* why they have the anti-union attitude - they may very well have a sane reasons for that one too.
------- Sorry about the spelling, I suffer from two problems. Dyslexia makes it difficult to spell well, lazy makes it
And how do you "get a new union" when the current union has a legal contract saying that the employer is not allowed to hire anyone in your line of work who isn't a member of that current union?
Have that contract declared illegal. Many countries have anti-cartel laws.
Yet in the US this happens all the time. People are forced to be in unions they dont want to be in and pay extremely high dues and receive nothing in return. My wife was forced at two different jobs to join the Union at one she made 9 dollars an hour the other 12. After dues taxes healthcare etc she made less than minimum wage and when she did need the Union due to a crappy boss they didnt do crap to help her. The unions in the US only exist now to serve themselves they once had their time but now many are openly rebelling against them as their demands are part of why all the jobs are leaving for china, mexico, and others.