Michael Buckner for Variety
The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers have reached an agreement in principle on a new basic agreement for Hollywood and a videotape agreement.
The deal concludes more than three months of negotiations between the union and the studios. Key provisions include a 7 percent increase in minimum wages in the first year, followed by 4 percent and 3.5 percent increases, matching the terms SAG-AFTRA reached last fall.
“We reached an agreement!” », announced the union in an email sent to its members Tuesday evening.
The three-year contract still needs to be ratified by union members. The AMPTP still needs to negotiate agreements with the Teamsters and other rank-and-file trade unions, as well as the regional standards agreement with IATSE.
But the interim basic agreement – which comes more than a month before the current contract expires on July 31 – will allay fears of another industry shutdown so soon after last year’s twin strikes.
Full terms of the deal were not disclosed, but they include “new pay-as-you-go residuals” to address a $670 million deficit in the pension and health plans – one of the key issues in the negotiations .
The union also reports that the tentative agreement includes new protections around the thorny topic of artificial intelligence, “including language that ensures that no employee is required to provide AI prompts in a manner that would result in the displacement of a covered employee.”
“These changes to the basic agreement are in addition to the agreements in principle reached during local agreement negotiations,” the message said.
The union also called for additional “quality of life” protections to address long work hours. Under the new agreement, workers will receive triple rates for any hours worked beyond 3 p.m. The aim of these provisions is to make productions that last such long days prohibitively expensive.
Quality of life issues were at the heart of IATSE negotiations in 2021, which nearly resulted in a strike. During this round of negotiations, the union called a strike authorization vote and members nearly rejected the tentative agreement.
This time around, both sides appeared keen to reach an agreement, given the difficulties in recovering from last year’s strikes. They allowed additional time for negotiations and the union did not consider it necessary to resort to strike authorization.
The major issue in the final days of negotiations concerned benefit plans. The film industry’s pension and health schemes are largely funded by hourly contributions and were therefore affected by last year’s six-month work stoppage.
“The tentative agreement includes additional payments from employers that would close the $670 million funding gap, including new pay-as-you-go residuals,” the union reported. “In addition, no participant will experience a break in service for plan year 2023.”
The basic agreement covers approximately 50,000 entertainment industry workers across 13 locals. The largest are the International Cinematographers Guild, the Film Editors Guild, and the Art Directors Guild.
The union’s negotiating committee, which represents the 13 guilds in negotiations with the studios, unanimously supported the deal.
Members and signatories will have access to a summary of the agreement in the coming days and a memorandum of understanding is expected in approximately two weeks. West Coast locals will hold meetings with members to review the terms, and IATSE will host a webinar for all locals affected by the contract on July 13.
The letter, signed by the leaders of each of the 13 locals, which was distributed to members follows:
Dear Sisters, Brothers and Parents of the Basic Agreement,
The Basic Agreement Negotiating Committee has reached an agreement in principle with the AMPTP. Below are some details of the proposed deal.
A full summary of the tentative agreement will be released in a few days, and in addition to the local town hall meetings, a multi-local webinar will be held on Saturday, July 13 at noon PDT to review the proposed language in the MOU. (MOA). To avoid harming our fellow members of the Regional Standards Agreement (ASA) locals, who remain in negotiations with the AMPTP, we will wait to publish the full summaries of the two tentative agreements simultaneously.
Some of the changes proposed in the basic agreement in principle include rate increases of 7%, 4% and 3.5% over the three-year term. Hourly workers will receive a triple rate (3x hourly) when a workday exceeds 15 hours elapsed, all on-call classifications will now receive a double rate on the 7th day of the workweek, and additional pay increases will take effect on non-drama productions under the Videotape Supplemental Agreement. The tentative agreement includes new protections around artificial intelligence, including language that ensures no employee is required to provide AI prompts in a manner that would result in the displacement of a covered employee . These changes to the basic agreement are in addition to the agreements in principle reached during the local agreement negotiations.
For the Motion Picture Industry Pension and Health Plans (MPIPHP), the tentative agreement includes additional payments from employers that would close the $670 million funding gap, including new streaming residuals . Additionally, no participant will experience a break in service for the 2023 plan year.
We thank everyone who participated in the 2024 Basic Agreement negotiation process. From start to finish, your contribution was invaluable and brought our negotiating committee to the negotiating table with goals clear and consensus on how to achieve them. The ratification schedule will be available soon and we look forward to presenting the entire file to you.