Union members discuss experiences in entertainment, thoughts on averting strike

Dodge alumni and California State University, Long Beach alumna Marcy Silver (pictured) spoke with The Panther about the recent developments for the film and television crew union. Photo courtesy of Rahma Farahat

Two days before the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) was set to strike Oct. 18, the union reached a tentative agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). Details of the agreement have not been fully released, since the lawyers are in negotiations.

Early details that have been released to employees and the public include the AMPTP making Martin Luther King Jr. Day a holiday for employees as well as providing daily 10-hour rest periods and increased wages. However, the agreement has been met with criticism from some crew members, who pointed out that not all points of concern have been addressed.

Rahma Farahat, an alumna of the Dodge College of Film and Media Arts, works as an assistant art director and is part of the IATSE Local 800 chapter, the Art Director’s Guild. Farahat told The Panther most of the points brought up in the negotiations between IATSE and the AMPTP, including working long hours on set, do not affect her.

“I would usually be there in the morning when (a shoot) starts (and) make sure everybody’s good and happy,” Farahat said. “An hour or two into it, I’ll move on, and I’ll go to what we’re prepping for the next day.”

Farahat said what did affect her was the rise in pension and healthcare contributions that on-call employees get when working five days a week. Prior to the agreement being reached, employees would be compensated for  60 hours, but that number is now set to increase to 65 and 70 hours in 2022 and 2023, respectively. Farahat said if she were getting phone calls at 9 p.m., she would be considered on-call, but her pay and pension “would not reflect that.”

“Even though I’ve only technically worked a certain amount of hours, the fact that I’ve made myself available and reachable (means) the employer now contributes more into my pension and health insurance,” Farahat said.

Farahat said while some information still has not been told to members, she does not feel she can make a definitive judgment on the agreement yet. While she is happy with what was achieved for the talking points that affected her, the 10-hour turnaround for crew members working on set was “not enough at all,” she added.

“That means a 14-hour workday and then having to drive home,” Farahat said. “If you want to have dinner (or) if you want to see your family (and) sleep, you have to do all of that within 10 hours, and that’s not enough; that’s not sustainable, and it’s not healthy.”

She feels that the turnaround should be 12 hours, since this would let crew members be able to drive home, spend time with family, take care of themselves and get the recommended eight hours of sleep. Farahat said most of her friends who work on set are not happy with the agreement, mainly because of the 10-hour turnaround.

“Collectively, all these unions stood together to make our work environment a better environment for everybody, and I feel like we could have asked for more,” Farahat said. “Having only gotten a 10-hour turnaround is very disappointing, and I think that’s what most of them are feeling, because a lot of those people who work on set normally work at least a 14-hour day.”

She explained if some crew members have a pre-call — meaning they come to set a couple of hours before the entire crew comes — and then have to organize and put away the props for another hour, the workday increases to 17 hours, after which the crew members have to drive home and get four hours of sleep before going back to work the next day.

Dodge alumni and California State University, Long Beach alumna Marcy Silver (pictured) spoke with The Panther about the recent developments for the film and television crew union. Photo courtesy of Rahma Farahat

Farahat also spoke about “Fraturdays,” a term used in the industry to describe when crew members work from Friday evening until Saturday morning.

“A lot of times, the schedule would start at 5 p.m. so that (the crew) can shoot all night,” Farahat said. “Sometimes it’s necessary to shoot at night, but most of the time it’s not, and they schedule it that way anyway. So, that eats up into your weekend, (and) you’re basically working until at least five, six, sometimes eight in the morning on Saturday. So, by the time you get home, your whole Saturday is basically gone, and you’re left with one day on the weekend just to turn back around and do it all over again the next week.”

Sophie Peter, another Dodge alumna, is a member of the Local 44 chapter and works as a set decorator, buying furniture to decorate with. She said while she has worked 12 and 14-hour days, she has never worked any longer than that.

Peter said that when crew members prepare to shoot something, the workload has an “ebb and flow.”

“When you’re first initially setting something up, the workload can be really crazy, and then it slows down when you’re shooting, and then it kind of, like, will ramp up again and go down again,” Peter said. “But the other thing is, (as a set decorator), you are off-production, so your hours aren’t being directly controlled by the assistant director ... (or) by (the) shooting crew. Although, if the shooting crew is shooting at a slower pace, it does allow you more time, which means you have shorter days or more reasonable days.”

Peter said that from what she has read from the bullet points on the fact sheets given to IATSE members, she is “not thrilled” with the agreement but does not feel it’s “absolutely terrible.” Though she acknowledges some progress was made, Peter said she also can empathize with the members who are upset that there was no information about streaming residuals in the agreement — as they wanted the residuals to fully fund their pension.

“I think what’s hard is that the AMPTP really just low-balled so hard in the beginning, but it is like they made considerable gains in negotiations like IATSE did, but then those gains aren’t what as much as membership in general wanted,” Peter said. “I can’t speak to what the general consensus really is, but I think the general kind of what membership wanted was more than what the current agreement is, myself included.”

Prop master Marcy Silver, another member of the Local 44 chapter, said that she has experienced the long hours issue on set.

“I’ve been conditioned to believe that (the long hours) was a necessary standard of filmmaking,” Silver said.

The California State University, Long Beach alumna told The Panther that since a lot of her close friends and collaborators work as art department coordinators, she feels “very disheartened” by the low rates they earn.

Silver also said that she feels “short-changed” about the tentative agreement, and she wants to see bigger changes before she starts to feel comfortable with the points brought up during negotiations. Silver said that she plans to vote against the agreement.

“We were essentially given crumbs and were expected to be happy with that, but the problems at hand are inherently systemic and necessitate big change now — not in three years,” Silver said. “Most, if not all, of my friends feel similarly. Most of my peers in the industry came up through the treacherous, non-union, indie world, and now that we have finally crossed the threshold and joined the union, it’s disheartening to recognize that working on big shows still feels dangerous and unsustainable.”

IATSE had set a strike date after an Oct. 4 vote, since months of negotiations had not been going anywhere at the time. When Farahat heard of this news, she felt “very excited.”

“I thought it was about time, because these negotiations had been going on for months, and that didn’t seem like it was going anywhere,” Farahat said. “They asked all the members to vote, and with an astounding percentage, the numbers voted ‘yes’ that we would authorize a strike. But, even then, it took a while to actually set a date. By the time it happened, (it) was like, ‘It’s about time we put our words into action.’ I wish it happened a little bit sooner, but we avoided it for now, so we’ll see what happens now.”

Silver, meanwhile, said the news felt like a possible source of relief during a very difficult work experience.

“The numbers from the vote itself made me cry at work in my truck, because they were so absolutely indicative of what we are all feeling,” Silver said.

Shortly after the strike date was revealed, Silver said she was one of many crew members who were called in to work additional days for longer hours so that projects could be finished before the strike started.

“I was finishing up a show that squeezed like hell to get everything in the can before the strike was to happen,” Silver said. “Nearly everyone I know worked a long Fraturday leading up to that Monday, and most also had heavy double-up days.”

In an Oct. 21 Instagram post, IATSE announced that of the four phases it would take for the Basic Agreement (West Coast members) and Area Standards Agreement (non-West Coast members) to be voted on, things are currently in the first phase. At this time, while the lawyers are working on the language for the Basic Agreement, West Coast chapters are meeting with their members to provide information on the agreement. The negotiators, meanwhile, are still working on the Area Standards Agreement, whose points will be modeled after the Basic Agreement.

Peter’s chapter met Oct. 19 for three hours to discuss the bullet points and give members a chance to ask any questions they had. Farahat’s chapter had a similar meeting Oct. 23.

The second phase will begin once negotiators finish working out the Area Standards Agreement and lawyers go over the language for it. Chapters for both agreements will still hold meetings to inform their members of the details. Once the lawyers finish, the dates of the ratification votes will be announced as part of the third phase. The final phase will consist of both agreements being digitally voted on at the same time during the same weekend; results will be shared with the members after.

Specific dates as to when these phases would happen have not been announced due to the fluidity of the situation.