Simply over a yr in the past, the performers in SAG-AFTRA went on strike in opposition to the main Hollywood studios and streamers over quite a lot of points together with an absence of AI protections. Now, the actors are on strike once more in opposition to online game studios whom they declare have refused to supply the identical AI protections that SAG-AFTRA secured following final yr’s strike.
“We have made offers with the studios and streamers,” stated SAG-AFTRA nationwide government director Duncan Crabtree-Eire throughout an interview with the Associated Press. “We have made offers with no strike with the main report labels and with numerous different employers, which give for knowledgeable consent and truthful compensation for our members. And but, for some motive, the online game corporations refuse to do this and that is what’s going to be their undoing.”
SAG-AFTRA members approved a strike final week after negotiations between the union and the online game publishers dragged on for 18 months with no decision. A few of the studios that the actors reached offers with final yr, together with Warner Bros. and Disney, have online game divisions as effectively. However that hasn’t led to any motion on a brand new protections for the actors who lend their voices and likenesses to video video games.
Till the strike is settled, SAG-AFTRA performers won’t be able to carry out any voiceover work for the online game corporations. And to kick off the primary main picket of the strike, the actors are protesting in entrance of Warner Bros. Studios in Burbank. That is the place a lot of them spent a protracted scorching summer season in 2023 earlier than a deal was lastly reached for movie and tv performers the next fall.