Cartoon by Doug Davis and Warren Scherffius.
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Cartoon by Doug Davis and Warren Scherffius.
November 30, 2007 in Actor Life | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Serious disagreements have arisen between the Screen
Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists,
largely over the issue of securing union coverage for scripted basic-cable
shows. Back Stage invited a board member from each union to address the issue.
Union War Puzzling
By Bill Ratner
In 2003, as one of the last merger meetings between SAG and AFTRA was wrapping up, an actor asked an adviser from the AFL-CIO: "What if the merger proposal doesn't fly and it is voted down by the membership?" The adviser answered, "Unless the two unions reconcile their differences, they'll destroy each other."
I thought to myself, "Nah, that can't happen." But since then the virulently anti-merger faction of SAG board members, Membership First, has fired two national executive directors and has found what it seems to want in ex-footballer Doug Allen. In a puzzling warlike stance, Allen is tackling AFTRA, spreading myths in the hopes that -- if they're told often enough -- people will believe them.
Allen authored an 11-page article in the fall 2007 issue of Screen Actor magazine in which he accuses AFTRA of undercutting SAG's basic-cable agreement, poaching shows, and refusing to reveal its basic-cable contracts. A new SAG-promulgated petition echoes these accusations and calls for the modification of Phase One, the agreement under which SAG and AFTRA have negotiated major contracts jointly since 1981.
Myth: AFTRA's contracts covering scripted basic-cable shows undercut the terms set in SAG's basic-cable agreement.
Truth: SAG and AFTRA have shared jurisdiction in scripted
basic-cable since the medium's inception in the early 1980s, but the two unions
have chosen different approaches to organizing this work. SAG offers a one-size-fits-all
contract, regardless of the economics of an individual show. For example, Monk
is a SAG-covered basic-cable show with a per-play residual formula. However, it
was shot in part in Canada
Myth: AFTRA is poaching basic-cable shows, which are SAG's territory.
Truth: You cannot poach what you already own. AFTRA has
been organizing scripted basic-cable programs since the 1980s. At a meeting
held last year in New York,
cable-company representatives said they did not want to solidify an
industrywide contract covering basic-cable shows.
Do some of AFTRA's basic-cable deals pay less than an
actor would make on CSI: Crime Scene Investigation? Of course. An episode of
CSI can have a budget in the millions; an episode of scripted basic-cable is
much lower. Do the math. A union performer can make a little less on the back
end on an AFTRA basic-cable show shot in the States or can get nothing at all,
while, according to AFTRA's data, approximately 50 percent of SAG basic-cable
shows are shot in
Myth: AFTRA won't show SAG its basic-cable contracts.
Truth: SAG and AFTRA leadership met repeatedly this year to discuss SAG's intention to modify Phase One, and AFTRA's basic-cable contracts were never on the agenda. AFTRA national executive director Kim Roberts Hedgpeth's stated policy is, "Any and all requests for contracts are being honored." AFTRA president Roberta Reardon recently asked members to report names of staff who refuse member contract requests. During the 2005 basic-cable talks with producers, despite Phase One's joint bargaining mandate, SAG refused to allow AFTRA to join the cable talks as a full partner, relegating AFTRA to an "observer" status.
The current factionalism of SAG's
For the 44,000 dual-cardholding SAG and AFTRA members, it is an ill-advised direction that Membership First, SAG president Alan Rosenberg, and Allen appear to be moving in.
By Frances Fisher
While SAG was successfully negotiating its first increase in live-action, basic-cable residuals in more than 16 years in 2006, AFTRA was negotiating individual contracts with basic-cable shows, offering "free exhibition windows" that allow producers to rerun TV series during the first year of the show without paying actors any residuals. Basic-cable shows that last only one season will never have to pay residuals. SAG basic-cable shows pay a residual for every rerun. Some AFTRA basic-cable shows pay low wages. An actor with five lines or less on an AFTRA-covered show can receive $341. SAG ensures day-players $759 per day under its TV/Theatrical Contract, and payment is not contingent on the number of lines. See contracts at www.sag.org.
WGA members are currently striking over setting new-media residuals. However, AFTRA has negotiated a contract with Nickelodeon that offers free Internet streaming for the next six years. So even if the WGA wins its strike, AFTRA actors on Nickelodeon shows won't get a crack at Internet residuals for the next six years.
AFTRA leaders say they must offer these contracts or the
work will go out of the country. Yet AFTRA shows like Kyle XY and The Best
Years are shot in
AFTRA leaders say the only solution to the mess they've created is to merge with SAG. If the unions merged now, SAG actors would be giving up half of their union to the current AFTRA board of directors, composed almost entirely of broadcasters, announcers, and voiceover artists. AFTRA board members are listed on www.aftra.org. Check out their credits on the Internet Movie Database (www.imdb.com); you will find that fewer than half of the board members are on-camera actors and most of them derive much of their income from commercials or voiceover work. When you read something from AFTRA officials, take a moment and ask yourself, "Are these stakeholders with their income on the line, or are they just interested in politics?" AFTRA is my parent union, and this year I ran for its national board -- and was elected -- to increase the small number of film and TV actors among its leadership.
AFTRA board members say they would like to settle jurisdiction issues, yet AFTRA is currently trying to withdraw its membership from the Associated Actors and Artistes of America, the cooperative union organization affiliated with the AFL-CIO that has brought SAG, AFTRA, Actors' Equity, and other performers' unions together to settle disputes since the 1950s.
There is a simple solution. In 2004 animation artists met with AFTRA and demanded that it stop undercutting TV animation contracts. The result? AFTRA and SAG TV animation contracts have been equal ever since. Why hasn't AFTRA stopped undercutting on-camera basic-cable contracts? Because its leaders haven't heard from you, the membership. It's not your fault; you've been kept deliberately in the dark. But dual cardholders have been reading the details of what AFTRA has been doing in the recent Screen Actor magazine issue.
Tell the leaders of both unions that you want AFTRA to equalize contracts with SAG and stop offering free exhibition windows and free Internet streaming. Send an email to [email protected] and cc a copy to sag_ned@sag.org. If you're an actor, SAG is your union; you have the final say in how your contracts are negotiated. But don't forget that AFTRA is your union too. Take it back from those who have forgotten that.
November 29, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)
Like each of director Todd Haynes' previous films, the new Bob Dylan anti-biography I'm Not There is a confounding mess that aspires for greatness, but falls just short enough of brilliance to become little more than a stylish and meandering exercise on film.
The premise: the legendary and mysterious Bob Dylan is too rich and complex a character to justify a traditional Ray or Walk the Line-style Behind the Music biopic, so Haynes cast six actors to portray Dylan as a series of shape-shifting personae, weaving together an unconventional portrait of an elusive American icon.
Marcus Carl Franklin is Woody, a precocious 11-year-old black child channeling the soul of influential folk singer Woody Guthrie; Ben Whishaw is Arthur, a poet modeled after Dylan influence Arthur Rimbaud; Christian Bale is Jack Rollins, and later Pastor John, a The Times They Are A-Changin' era protest singer who throws it away to become a Christian minister; Heath Ledger is Robbie Clark, an actor who plays Jack Rollins in a movie; Richard Gere is Billy the Kid, an Old West outlaw living in seclusion in the wrong times; and Cate Blanchett is Jude Quinn, an androgynous and electrified Dylan of the 60's and the documentary Dont Look Back.
And they're all Bob Dylan. Or maybe none of them are.
The inherent challenge in cutting up Dylan's life, then trying to add it all up again like some complicated calculus formula, is making the puzzle pieces fit in a way that is somehow more interesting than the sum of its parts. Individually, none of the characters or stories in I'm Not There reveal much about Dylan that fans wouldn't already know. But together, the segments congeal into a fascinating portrait of an ever-changing American artist.
But like I said before, this film is a mess. Even though Haynes and his co-writer Oren Moverman clearly know their subject (as well as anyone other than the man himself probably can), a unified "Dylan" remains out of reach. Gere's Billy and Ledger's Robbie offer insight into the man's private life, while Blanchett's rock star Jude, Bale's prophet Jack, and Whishaw's poet Arthur only seem to regurgitate the most familiar elements of his legend. Franklin as Woody is perhaps the most ambitious casting choice, the only character to fully capture Dylan's baffling chameleon qualities that inspired this project in the first place.
I'm Not There combines stylistic elements of Haynes' previous films, from the multiple disjointed stories and varied techniques (documentary, narrative, fantasy, etc.) of Poison, to the fictionalized biopic treatment of rock stars David Bowie and Iggy Pop in Velvet Goldmine, to the grand beauty and loving homage of Far From Heaven.
Unfortunately, it also keeps those films' cold distance from their respective subjects, something I feel Haynes has never been able to overcome. By telling several stories at once, in ways that rarely connect A to B, Haynes reminds the audience that they shouldn't care about only one version of Bob Dylan--and as a result, we don't really care about any of them. Instead, the film devolves into a guessing game for Dylan fans (What song is that dialogue from? What obscure reference can they squeeze in next?) and a baffling brain teaser for neophytes.
This is where it all starts to fall apart. For all the subtly clever insights into the many lives of a man who is continually, almost obsessively, reinventing himself, there are far too many obvious and jarring moments based on his fame. Some familiar scenes are translated directly from previous interviews, documentary footage, or bootleg concerts. A whimsical homage to The Beatles' A Hard Day's Night is fun but quickly overshadowed by more unnecessary (and far less Dylan-related) references to Fellini and Godard.
Blanchett, who as Jude is the film's powerful central force (and gives by far its best performance), speaks almost entirely in Dylan quotes and lyrics. When in conversation or sparring with reporters she laughs the line "Just like a woman!" or sneers "How does it feel?," and the effect is laughable and cringe-inducing. Franklin's lines are also almost exclusively cribbed from lyric sheets, but this is more forgivable because of Woody's nature as a pretender trying to make up his own mythical back story, based on his Depression-era folk and blues heroes.
Maybe I'm just a little gun-shy in a year that has also seen the release of Julie Taymor's Beatles-based Across the Universe, but literal interpretations of lyrics on screen, or character names based on popular Dylan song lyrics or titles, make me gag. A girlfriend named Louise is accompanied on the soundtrack by "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands," the song from which her name came; British journalist Keenan Jones (Bruce Greenwood) finds himself trapped in an interpretive performance of "Ballad of a Thin Man" (and even sees "somebody naked, and asks 'Who is that man?'"); Jude Quinn's last name originates in "Quinn the Eskimo (The Might Quinn);" and of course, young Woody is Woody Guthrie (and even writes "This Machine Kills Fascists" on his guitar).
In supporting roles, David Cross as beat poet Allen Ginsberg and Julianne Moore as the Joan Baez-type folk singer Alice Fabian are two bright spots. Charlotte Gainsbourg, as Ledger's French wife, is satisfactory but is given far too much screen time on her own, so that their shared story becomes muddled and less about Dylan than his family back home.
I'm Not There is a complicated, contradictory film about a contradictory artist, and criticizing it as such risks missing the point. Kudos to Haynes for trying something so utterly ambitious and fresh, and in doing so crafting his masterpiece; it's just disappointing that once again, the auteur falls just short of capturing brilliance--either Dylan's or his own. But after seeing it, I found myself wanting to talk about it nonstop, and even now continue to change my mind as my opinions remain malleable. And maybe that's the point, after all.
The big question remains: is I'm Not There aimed toward Dylan fanatics looking to spot every reference, or casual viewers who are willing to just sit back and enjoy the ride? If you've seen it, leave a comment and let us know what you think.
I'm Not There is currently at Film Forum in NYC.
November 28, 2007 in Movies | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Cartoon by Doug Davis and Warren Scherffius.
November 23, 2007 in Actor Life | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Back Stage, AFTRA, and the Fine Arts Theatre invite you to a fundraiser screening of AFTRA: Commitment to Action, a documentary featuring Bob Barker, retired host of The Price is Right, and other TV and radio personalities, that takes an inside peek at how AFTRA members rely on the union for representation and respect.
A panel discussion and presentation honoring Bob Barker will follow the screening. Tom Bergeron (Dancing with the Stars, Hollywood Squares) will present.
The event will be held Thursday, Nov. 29, 7:30 p.m., at the Fine Arts Theatre, 8556 Wilshire Blvd., Beverly Hills.
Tickets for this fundraiser event are available online at www.studioscreenings.com. Prices are $10 regular admission, $5 for students and seniors.
All attendees will receive free concessions. $2 validated parking available at 8484 Wilshire (S.E. corner of Wilshire and La Cienega).
For more info on AFTRA, visit www.aftra.com.
November 22, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Following up a post from Blog Stage last week, the New York Times has a review of Saturday night's live, camera-less performance of Saturday Night Live. The sold-out show was hosted by Michael Cera at the Upright Citzen's Brigade Theatre in Chelsea.
“We’re like cranky trained monkeys if we don’t get to perform,” SNL cast member Amy Poehler, who is also a founder of the theater, told the Times. “We all thought about what we’re going to do during the strike, and because we have no other skills, we just scraped this together.”
A sold-out live performance of former SNL writer Tina Fey's sitcom 30 Rock is scheduled for tonight at the theatre.
November 19, 2007 in Comedy, Television | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
A second day of talks between striking stagehands and Broadway producers broke down on Saturday, leaving performances canceled and theatres dark until at least November 25, at the start of one of Broadway's most lucrative periods every year.
Producers walked away from the table at a theater district hotel after 12 hours of negotiations, telling the stagehands' union that its offers "were not enough," said a representative of Local One of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. No new talks were scheduled.
27 shows remain closed, with only eight open, and the strike is reportedly costing the city at least $2 million a day.
"We presented a comprehensive proposal that responded to the union's concerns about loss of jobs and earnings, and attempted to address our need for some flexibilities in running our business," Charlotte St. Martin, executive director of the League of American Theatres and Producers, said. "The union rejected our effort to compromise."
Newsday and amNewYork also offer advice on how to get a refund on show tickets.
But good news for some holiday theatre-goers: Playbill.com reports today that "Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas, the first show that was affected by the strike, may open its doors as early as Tuesday, Nov. 20...
The reason Grinch may be able to reopen is the production
negotiated its own contract with Local One, the stagehands union, prior
to the strike because the musical offers 12 or so performances a week,
different from the eight-performance schedule most other shows offer."
Grinch is scheduled to run until January 6 at the St. James Theatre in NYC.
November 19, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Those of us at Back Stage who have been reporting on the potential of a Writers Guild of America strike since last spring were not surprised when the writers officially walked out Nov. 5. Neither were most actors and other entertainment professionals.
But even we are surprised by how quickly the writers are bringing this seemingly all-powerful, billion-dollar industry to its knees—a testament to the power of creative forces behind every film and TV show. Tina Fey, Steve Carell, Eva Longoria, Nicollette Sheridan, Sally Field, David Hyde Pierce, and Jay Leno have all made appearances on the picket lines; the support of these high-profile actors, some of whom belong to the WGA and the Screen Actors Guild, has brought more attention to the writers' cause.
Perhaps most impressive were the 125 showrunners, including Silvio Horta and Marco Pennette (Ugly Betty), Marc Cherry (Desperate Housewives), Neal Baer (Law & Order: Special Victims Unit), Doug Ellin (Entourage), Carlton Cuse (Lost), and John Wells (ER), who walked off their own shows to picket Nov. 8 at Walt Disney Studios in Burbank, Calif. A number of showrunners are WGA members and some chose not to continue their nonwriting duties, essentially shutting down their lucrative series in order to support their writers. As series shutter, studios such as Sony Pictures TV (producers of 'Til Death and Rules of Engagement, among others) may put series regulars on "unpaid hiatus." Also, striking showrunners could face breach-of-contract lawsuits from studios.
Given the threats, the layoffs, dwindling auditions, and even the traffic jams at studio gates, it's hard not to resent WGA members at least a little for causing such an uproar. Laid-off production professionals—actors in addition to grips, gaffers, assistant directors, set dressers, makeup and hair artists, caterers, and assistants, to name a few—can't help but think the writers selfish for cutting off industry folks' livelihoods in a matter of days.
Nellie Andreeva, television editor for The Hollywood Reporter, pointed out that most of the country—and even most Los Angeles and New York residents—aren't inclined to be sympathetic to the writers' plight either. "[Writers] are perceived as white-collar millionaires (which is true for a fraction of them)," she wrote in a Nov. 12 article. "While grocery-store workers picket in front of supermarkets—a relatable place that people go to all the time—writers march at studio lots. Maybe writers should go to people's homes and stand in front of their TVs."
Of course, WGA members would have to block more than plasma screens already filling up with reality shows and reruns in lieu of original programming. Writers would have to station strikers at every computer with Internet access and commandeer every video iPod to truly get their point across—and actors would have every reason to stand beside those writers, because whatever the WGA loses or gains from this strike will likely set a precedent that will affect SAG, the Directors Guild, and potentially even the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and the International Brotherhood of Teamsters.
In fact, if SAG's TV/Theatrical Contract with producers had expired before the WGA's Minimum Basic Agreement did Oct. 31, actors would have probably been the ones marching off sets and chanting catchy strike slogans. The responsibility of battling for new-media residuals simply fell to the WGA first. And if the writers strike continues into the spring and summer—a bleak possibility, indeed—actors could officially join them in a combined strike if SAG does not negotiate a new TV/Theatrical contract by June 30, 2008. Perhaps SAG and the WGA can coordinate their contracts' expiration dates in the future to give both unions more immediate power on the picket lines.
Of course, it's easy to sit in a reporter's cubicle and lecture actors on how to weather a long drought of work with vigilance and grace. Journalists will still be working no matter the outcome of the WGA strike—indeed, the strike has given many of us more work than we can handle. What we as members of the media can do is continue to keep our readers informed with accurate, unbiased coverage on our website and in the weekly print edition of Back Stage, and to serve as an outlet for actors' voices in these challenging times.
We encourage you to visit BackStage.com for daily strike coverage, analyses, and links to past articles on new media and other related issues. The Hollywood Reporter also hosts a "Strike Zone" with the latest news at www.hollywoodreporter.com/strike. For SAG updates and picket-line locations, visit the "WGA Strike Information Center" at www.sag.org or call the guild's WGA Strike Information Hotline: (877) 724-7875.
-- Back Stage staff
November 16, 2007 | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
It's become a sort of legend among fanboys and film geeks alike: in 1982, three 12-year-old boys saw Raiders of the Lost Ark, loved it (of course), and spent their next seven summers filming a shot-for-shot remake in their backyards, remaking Spielberg's $26 million blockbuster with their allowances. In 1989, the 100-minute Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation, complete with rolling boulder, live snakes, and red-hot flames, was completed, screened once—and then left on a shelf, forgotten.
Until recently. Earlier this year, Wired published a feature story about the boys' adventures in filmmaking. Since a rediscovery of the tape in 2003, the film has screened at festivals, and Ain't It Cool News' Harry Knowles, horror director Eli Roth, and even Steven Spielberg himself are among its fans. And producer Scott Rudin has purchased the intellectual property rights to the boys' childhood, with Daniel Clowes (Ghost World) writing the script about the trio's years-long summer "hobby."
From Wired:
There were setbacks. Zala nearly suffocated while making a plaster cast of his head. In removing it, doctors at the hospital plucked both his eyebrows off. (Lesson learned: use papier-mâché, not cement plaster.) With no monkey available to play Marion's mascot, the teens were forced to cast Snickers, a beagle-terrier mix, instead. The crew transformed Boy Scout uniforms into Nazi costumes and suburban Mississippi woods into the Amazonian rainforests, and spent four years creating a giant boulder to chase Indy.
All of Raiders: The Adaptation's effects were done in camera -- no digital touch-ups here. The film, shot on VHS, is grainy and at times nearly inaudible, but the cast and crew's unadulterated love for the source material is crystal clear.
"Being a kid, you don't know what you can't do, which is helpful when you are trying make a $26 million film on your allowance," Zala said. "(Kids') motivations are the purest, and they aren't unduly swayed by commercial considerations or a Teamsters strike or even the mortgage. It's about the love of the story."
The Village Voice says:
Filled with ingenious contraptions and overweening jerry-rigs, The Adaptation remakes Raiders on less than 1/2,000th of Paramount's original $20 million budget, conjuring exotic locales out of cardboard sets in parents' basements, casting tweens in Boy Scout uniforms as Nazi bad guys, and rolling a gigantic hand-crafted boulder through the family garage to create the film's signature scene. Nothing short of slapdash spectacular, The Adaptation is indie (or Indy?) filmmaking taken to its greatest and most sublimely ridiculous extreme.
And Sarah Hepola wrote for the Austin Chronicle:
This is not ‘cute’ or ‘impressive considering their age’ – it is a genuine virtuoso work. The film is a crowd-pleaser, turning all the Raiders action... into a new and genuinely startling viewing experience. How will they do this next scene? How can they pull that stunt off? And don’t forget that these kids are literally growing up in front of the camera. Voices deepen, hairstyles change, the hero grows stubble, the heroine grows breasts. Though writers abuse this phrase…it’s like nothing you’ve seen before.
Watch the trailer:
This weekend, Raiders of the Lost Ark: The Adaptation is back at Anthology Film Archives in NYC. The Village Voice reports, "filmmakers Eric Zala and Chris Strompolos—now all grown up—will be on hand to take questions. (Hint: Ask them about the time they set Zala’s basement on fire.) For those who want to compare and contrast, there will be a screening of Spielberg’s original on Saturday and Sunday."
November 16, 2007 in Movies | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)
Cartoon by Doug Davis and Warren Scherffius.
November 16, 2007 in Actor Life | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)