SAG-AFTRA Strike Could Hinge On AI; Deep Divisions Remain Between Actors & Studios In Final Hours Of Talks

EXCLUSIVE: The computers are taking over.

As talks between the actors union and the studios come to down to the final days before the extension of SAG-AFTRA’s current contract expires, artificial intelligence has become a significant obstacle to any deal.  

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“There seems to be no real negotiations here,” a SAG-AFTRA member close to talks tells Deadline on AI talks with the AMPTP.  “Actors see Black Mirror’s ‘Joan Is Awful’ as a documentary of the future, with their likenesses sold off and used any way producers and studios want.” The union member is referring to the opening episode of the latest season of the Charlie Brooker-created satire starring Salma Hayek and Annie Murphy.  “We want a solid pathway. The studios countered with ‘trust us’ – we don’t.”

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Just like the striking WGA before it, the Fran Drescher-led 160,000-strong union wants heavy duty assurances and guarantees in terms of the deployment, reach and scope of AI in the industry for its members. Having just put a new set of proposals on the negotiating table, the AMPTP allegedly doesn’t want to discuss the potentially game-changing matter in any substantial way, various sources tell me.

“The agreement with the DGA is a good basis for discussion,” a streamer exec said of the deal for AI “consultation” the guild made with the AMPTP and overwhelmingly ratified last month. “This is a town [built] on relationships. Only the whackjobs want to blow this up; they’re the ones stopping a deal,” he asserted.

“This is a power grab, pure and simple,” a well-established actress said of the AMPTP’s stance on AI. “We see what’s coming. They can’t pretend we won’t be used digitally or become the source of new, cheap, AI-created content for the studios.”

Cognizant to the perils of AI, one insider also sees the emphasis on the technology in the labor talks as a red herring of sorts.

“What AI does is in these talks is allow the Meryl Streeps of the world and other high-profile union members to focus their attention on the fact of an underlying transformational change,” he warned. “It’s a straightforward-enough concept that people who ordinarily don’t get involved in labor relations can see this whole business model and where the business is going is bad. Bad for me, bad for everyone. And it becomes a rallying cry, but the issues run deeper than that.”

RELATED: SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher Back To Lead Last-Ditch Effort To Reach A Contract – After A Weekend In Italy Mugging For Cameras With Pal Kim Kardashian At Dolce & Gabbana Show

Originally set to lapse at midnight on June 30, the current contract was extended by both sides at the end of last month with less than six hours to go. Now the contract will expire at midnight PT on July 12. Overseas for most of the past week, and seen posing for pics in Italy with Kim Kardashian (who was said to have crossed WGA pickets in NYC for American Horror Story filming), Drescher is supposed to be “returning to LA from Italy tomorrow for the last two days of negotiations for the guild’s film and TV contract,” a SAG-AFTRA spokesperson told Deadline this evening.

Chairing SAG-AFTRA’s negotiating committee — with Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, the guild’s national executive director, serving as chief negotiator — the former Nanny star certainly will have her work cut out for her.

With divisions over AI and issues like residuals running deep in the talks, it appears quite likely at this point that SAG-AFTRA’s members could be on strike by the morning of July 13. Under media blackout, the negotiations continue. However, during the past week, pickets signs are being prepared and lists of volunteers are being set up, among other measures being put in place in anticipation of a strike.

Today union reps even spoke to some of the town’s leading PR folk on a conference call to discuss how a labor action would play out.

According to sources, Crabtree-Ireland and other top SAG-AFTRA leaders sounded pretty certain during the call that there would be a strike. In the information sessions this afternoon, Crabtree-Ireland, Ray Rodriguez, the guild’s chief contracts officer, and SAG-AFTRA communications boss Pam Greenwalt described the rules for talent who should be wrapping up all promotional activities, including press junkets, by Friday in the event of a strike, we hear.

After that, the roughly 140 publicists on the call were bluntly told that actors are not to do any work for any projects. To be crystal clear, that tool-down includes taping routine promotional materials like EPKs or appearing at events like San Diego Comic-Con or the Emmys (whose nominations set to be unveiled in the morning of July 12). In the nearly hourlong exchange, the SAG-AFTRA leaders said the guild is prepared to sanction any members who do not follow the strict strike guidelines.

Or, as 2001: A Space Odyssey’s HAL 9000 said: “Sorry to interrupt the festivities, Dave, but I think we’ve got a problem.”

Nellie Andreeva contributed to this report.

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