Setting the Record Straight

Since the AMPTP-SAG negotiations ended with the presentation of the Producers’ final offer on June 30, 2008, SAG’s negotiators have made a number of unsubstantiated statements that we believe should be addressed.

July 28, 2008 Hollywood Reporter – Doug Allen

SAG Statement: The problem is they're asking us to accept a deal that doesn't have the minimum standards necessary to protect actors and has negative consequences that could last for decades and really affect the professional actor in maintaining their lives and families without having a second or third job.

The Facts:

• While SAG members currently have almost no new media production rights, the Producers’ new media framework grants SAG shared jurisdiction with AFTRA over original new media programs, including low-budget projects that employ a single “covered actor.” 
  
  
• All of the new media terms in the Producers’ final offer, including those related to original new media programs, are subject to a sunset clause that protects both performers and Producers by allowing the two sides to reevaluate all of the new media terms in three years and bargain from a point of greater knowledge about the market’s development.

SAG’s July 17 Message to Members

SAG Statement: It makes no sense for SAG to agree to allow the studios and networks to exacerbate our problem by giving them a pass to produce entirely non-union under a SAG union contract.

The Facts:

• Since 2001, the Producers have been unrestricted in producing derivative and non-derivative new media projects non-union under Sideletter 21 of the SAG Basic Agreement and Sideletter H of the SAG TV Agreement.  The Producers currently have the right to produce union or non-union.  For seven years, the SAG collective bargaining agreement has given Producers the right to do just what SAG now claims is unacceptable.
   
• The Producers’ proposal grants greater rights to SAG by significantly restricting the Producers’ ability to produce new media programs non-SAG.
  
  
• All original new media programs employing a single “covered actor” would be automatically covered under the SAG agreement.  This represents a significant concession on the part of the Producers.
  
  
• Only low budget productions that do not employ a SAG “covered actor” would be outside the scope of contract coverage.   This is intended to allow Producers to effectively compete and experiment with low budget original new media without being priced out of the market by expensive and restrictive contract terms.

SAG Statement: The DGA and WGA agreed to allow producers to make new media productions entirely non-union, at the producers’ option, for projects below budgets of $15,000 per minute (effectively, almost all new media productions for the foreseeable future.)

The Facts:

• Those new WGA and DGA contracts extend union jurisdiction to new media productions budgeted below $15,000 per minute whenever a qualifying member, e.g. a ‘professional writer,’ is employed.   The proposal to SAG does the same thing so that whenever a “covered actor” is employed, the production is also covered.
  
  
• The definition of “covered actor” is broad enough to capture most professional actors (those with two TV or film credits, a national commercial, work on an audio book). These provisions also ensure union coverage for all actors, union or otherwise, if a single “covered actor” is employed.

SAG Statement: AMPTP’s recent offer to SAG doesn’t include residuals for programs made for new media and streamed again on ad-supported new media platforms.

The Facts:

• The Producers’ final offer includes residuals for both ad-supported and consumer pay reuse of new media programs derived from existing SAG television series.  The Producers have proposed a more limited residual payment for original new media programs.
  
  
• The Producers are unwilling to agree to the residual structure suggested by SAG for original new media programs because current economics indicate that the Producers are unlikely to even recover their production costs.   
  
  
• For the same reason, under the new media terms offered to SAG and accepted by the WGA, DGA and AFTRA, original new media programs budgeted at or above $25,000 per minute as exhibited generate residuals at 3.6% of distributor’s gross on consumer pay platforms such as paid streaming or download-to-own. 

SAG Statement: The template doesn’t protect actors … we don’t believe the template works for SAG members.

The Facts:

• The 33 pages of new media rights and residuals laid out in the AMPTP’s final offer give SAG members numerous terms that have never previously existed in the SAG contract. 
  
  
• Until SAG’s negotiators secure a new contract, its members will continue to work under the expired terms, which include little in the way of new media residuals or jurisdiction. 
  
  
• The Producers’ final offer would immediately give performers their first-ever residuals for ad-supported streaming and made for new media programs while doubling the rate that has been paid for permanent downloads.  SAG members deserve to share in the same new media revenue that the other Guild members are already getting – and nothing short of a new contract will allow that to happen.

SAG’s July 28 Message to Members

SAG Statement: This does not mean that new media is our only focus.  We know that you are also concerned about such bargaining priorities as product integration, force majeure, background actors’ issues and mileage.  We will be communicating with you in more depth on these and other bargaining priorities in the coming days.

The Facts:

• SAG members continue to work under an expired contract for one simple reason: SAG’s negotiators are holding on several exceedingly expensive and unacceptable proposals that the Producers have rejected since these talks began over three months ago. 
  
  
• SAG’s negotiators have sought to focus attention on one narrow dispute in new media, while failing to mention that proposals such as a DVD residual increase remain on the table.
  
  
• The Producers’ final offer includes significant gains in minimums, Pension and Health contributions and increases benefiting guest stars, background actors and other working performers.  The Producers’ final offer of more than $250 million represents more than a 25% gain over the 2005 contract, which SAG-AFTRA described as “the most lucrative deal in the history of actor/producer collective bargaining.”