HILLSBOROUGH COUNTY, Fla. — Tampa Bay may not be seen as a spotlight for big screen productions, but the writers and potential actors unions striking the big studios in Hollywood affect the Sunshine State.
Florida is a right-to-work state, so those who work in the industry and live here aren’t typically part of these unions. Still, the current writer’s strike is already affecting the work they’re getting and the productions that were scheduled to come to the Tampa area.
“I recently got hired to do a television show for a large studio,” explained Tampa Bay native non-union actor and producer Paul Wilson. “They liked me, loved my audition, loved what I was doing, and said, ‘Okay, stay in shape. We'll see you in five months.’”
The Writers Guild of America (WGA) represents 11,500 film, television, news, radio, and online writers. The union has been on strike since the beginning of May after contract negotiations with the Alliance Of Motion Picture And Television Producers (AMPTP) failed.
The AMPTP represents 350 companies called “the studios,” such as Paramount, Netflix, Warner Bros, Universal Studios, and Disney.
The demands of the WGA include wage increases to keep up with the cost of living, better pay structure for streaming residuals, and studio commitment not to use artificial intelligence to replace or imitate them.
Residuals are the payments made to writers and actors after a show is released as it airs more often. It’s what many in the industry survive off between jobs. But when shows are re-aired on streaming platforms like Hulu or Netflix, those residual payments are much smaller.
The rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is also worrisome for anyone who creates or contributes to content in production.
“The legal definition of copyright ownership is a human being owns it. So obviously, there's a lot of worry about AI replacing actors, but what about writers? There are bots out there right now that you can throw a little plot into your little system and bang! You got a script,” Wilson exclaimed.
The Screen Actors Guild - American Federation of Television and Radio Artists is an American labor union (SAG-AFTRA) representing 160,000 film and TV actors, journalists, radio personalities, recording artists, singers, voice actors, internet influencers, fashion models, and other media professionals.
Monday, the SAG-AFTRA union approved a strike to start at the end of the month if their negotiations with the AMPTP don’t solve many of the same concerns as the WGA.
Hillsborough County Film Commissioner Tyler Martinolich said three smaller feature films with planned productions in the Tampa area in the next few weeks have already been postponed until the fall.
“Last year, we almost did $20 million commercial productions. This year we were on our way to possibly doing around that same number; we'll see after the summer,” Martinolich said, “So they're also betting that the writers and SAG strike might last a couple months through the summer.”
Kelly Paige runs Level Talent Group out of Tampa and said that because Florida is a “right-to-work state” and a national leader in commercial production, most of her actors still have work.
Paige believes the bigger issue is the lack of incentive for any studios to want to bring productions to the state.
“I think what's hurt us the most is that we do not have statewide film incentive. When we did, we brought in nearly $5 billion in three short years. Since it has expired, we've probably lost over 100 television series, films, things like that. And that's probably over $2 billion,” Paige said.
Both Paige and Martinolich say tourism is affected when screen time lags.
“Look at Stranger Things… Look at the Walking Dead. They have tours now. You know the Walking Dead created a whole city that is populated now with 12 hotels. It used to have one!” Paige exclaimed.
“There's been plenty of studies that show one in five individuals decide where they're going to vacation at directly because they saw a destination in a TV series, commercial, or feature. So by not having that volume of productions, we're not having the eyeballs we might have otherwise would have had on the Bay Area,” Martinolich added.
Because Wilson isn’t part of the SAG-AFTRA union, he said the gig economy will be a survival method for Hollywood hopefuls.
“I find supplemental income other ways. And I think that's what a lot of actors do. How many do you know that are maybe waiting tables or maybe driving Uber right now? I mean, doing noble things just to pay the bills. It's gonna get a lot worse, I think, if they continue to strike,” he said.
The WGA strike has also already delayed several movies. According to Entertainment Weekly, Its shows include Stranger Things, Cobra Kai, Yellowjackets, and Abbott Elementary seasons, as well as the Marvel movie Blade and a new Spiderman.
The Director’s Guild of America (DGA) also recently negotiated with the studios and reached an agreement on Sunday.
