Blog Stage - Acting in Film, TV, Theatre - Backstage

Strike Threat Looms Over 2012—Or Does It?

Will a strike shut down the film and television industry next year? You would think so, if you read The New York Times last weekend. Citing statements made to members of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees at a series of town hall–style meetings, the Times asserts that IATSE and allied craft unions covering behind-the-scenes personnel are facing a $500 million pension and health shortfall by 2015. The unions, which will bargain jointly on pension and health issues in the spring, are already tossing around tough talk about next year’s negotiations. “We’re going to be asking for a lot of money, lots of it,” the Times quotes IATSE president Matthew Loeb as telling Los Angeles Local 80 members in September.

The Case Against the Case Against Video on Demand

In between his reviews of “Tower Heist” and “Melancholia,” New Yorker film critic Anthony Lane goes off on a rant this week against the creeping menace of video on demand, treating the emerging film-distribution trend as if he were Greece and VOD were a German-backed bailout program. For those of you just tuning in, Universal last month announced plans to make “Tower Heist” available to half a million households in the Atlanta and Portland, Ore., areas for home viewing at $59.99 a pop, beginning three weeks after the film’s theatrical release. Theater owners threatened revolt, saying they would refuse to screen the film if Universal followed through on its plan. The studio blinked, ensuring that Georgia’s and Oregon’s laziest Eddie Murphy fans will now have to wait for the DVD (or for someone to upload a copy to the Web).

It’s Steve Jobs’ World; You’re Just Acting in It

In the short time since Steve Jobs passed away this week, there has been more written about how he changed the way we live than any one person could ever hope to read. Media oversaturation is the norm when a person of Jobs’ fame dies in our current, hyper-connected age. But Jobs’ death is the rare case in which the attention is warranted—because without the company that he created, was fired from, then reinvigorated upon his return, we would not have the hyper-connectivity that makes it possible for mourning him to be a national pastime.

Big Day for Net Neutrality, Cold War Metaphors

The Federal Register today published the Federal Communication Commission's much agonized-over net neutrality rules, signaling that the new regulations will go into effect Nov. 20. At last, our long national nightmare is over.

Upload, Me Hearties, Yo Ho: 'Black Swan' Leak Proves Need to Educate Artists on Piracy

Entertainment industry types hate piracy—not just the act, but the word itself. “Piracy,” the thinking goes, calls to mind Johnny Depp, two-time People magazine Sexiest Man Alive. The preferred term, “content theft,” presumably evokes less sensual thoughts. (Unless, of course, those thoughts are of the thieves in “Ocean’s Eleven,” whose cast includes not one but three former Sexiest Men Alive.)

Silly Season: The Harsh Reality of Summer

Proving that it’s more than just a medium through which to request that The Hollywood Reporter "get the fuck out of" one's face, Deadline.com last week posted a pretty insightful short piece on how summer broadcast TV is all about crappy reality shows now and why that sucks. The gist of it is that the networks used to experiment with new reality formats during the summer but haven’t for the last few years, and that now tired old reality shows are getting their butts kicked by solid scripted cable programming, such as TNT’s “Rizzoli & Isles” and “The Closer.” (Clearly, we mean “solid” from a business standpoint, not an artistic one.)

Less Color in Your TV: Onscreen Diversity in Decline

“Undercovers” was not very good. Neither were “Outsourced,” “Outlaw,” and “The Event.” Hell, neither were most of the new shows on NBC’s schedule last fall, which is a big reason why many of them are not on NBC’s schedule this fall. Sometimes bad TV shows rake in huge ratings (see Sheen, Charlie), and sometimes they get canceled. Them’s the breaks.

Dream Big, Realistically: Of Small Casts and Big Economics

It’s no secret that theater casts are getting smaller. With theater companies across the country facing tough financial decisions, scheduling more small-cast or one-person shows and fewer large-cast productions provides a proven way to stretch increasingly scarce funding dollars. Of course, that means fewer jobs for actors. As Actors’ Equity Association noted in its most recent annual report, the 2009-10 season was the second straight in which the number of jobs for Equity members declined. The report went so far as to link those declines directly to “seasons and shows becoming smaller.” For this, of course, you can thank the giant vampire squids who ruined the economy and the elected officials who have adopted a Bến Tre strategy for saving it.

AFTRA Soaps Up: Union in 'AMC,' 'OLTL' Talks

The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists is in discussions with Prospect Park over the entertainment firm’s plans to turn “All My Children” and “One Life to Live” into Web series. Talks began shortly after the company announced earlier this month that it would license the rights to the shows from ABC, which will cease broadcasting the long-running soaps this year. AFTRA is in the process of scheduling meetings with cast members to address their concerns and advise them of their rights under the union’s Network Code agreement.

Second Coming: Will the Web Save Soap Operas?

Let us travel now back to the 1860s, to the city of Brooklyn, N.Y. The Civil War dominates the collective consciousness. Everywhere one looks, bearded, bedraggled white men can be found brewing their own alcohol and butchering their own meat—just as they can now. And James Stranahan, a former congressman, leads the effort to build a public park in the heart of the city, something along the lines of the magnificent Central Park being constructed across the river. Stranahan believes that Brooklyn’s park will “become a favorite resort for all classes of our community, enabling thousands to enjoy pure air, with healthful exercise, at all seasons of the year.” He also believes that it will drive up real estate prices and attract wealthy new residents. (Yes, even then, Brooklyn was rapidly gentrifying.) Stranahan’s vision would yield Prospect Park, a place that would give generations of surrounding locals a good excuse not to schlep all the way into Manhattan on nice summer weekends.