Hollywood’s behind-the-scenes workers could cripple the entertainment industry with strike
In the skies over Hollywood a small plane pulls a banner reading “vote yes”.
On a monitor on a movie set, the same words are scrawled on a piece of luminous tape.
On a crane hoisting bits of scenery into place, the same slogan is emblazoned in big letters.
The workers are angry about their pay and conditions
That simple message is at the heart of a dispute which could shut down movie and television production across the United States within days.
The 60,000 members of the International Association of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) are voting this weekend on whether to authorise the first strike in the union’s history.
If it goes ahead it would be the biggest private sector strike in the US for decades and would cripple much of the country’s entertainment industry.
The union represents the behind-the-scenes workers, camera operators, stage hands, set designers, dozens of jobs in the armies it takes to create our favourite shows and movies.
They are unhappy at what they see as longer shifts, poor working conditions and low pay. An industry that has just emerged from the shutdown of the pandemic is ready for more wholesale disruption in the cause of fairness.
IATSE members have received support from across the entertainment industry and members have flooded the Instagram account @ia_stories with their unhappy tales of life in the business.
Cinematographer Peyton Skelton crashed his car after an 80-hour week
Cinematographer Peyton Skelton recounted how he had crashed his car driving home from work early on a Saturday morning after an 80-hour week. “The toll on the body and toll on the mentality of each worker is great,” he told Sky News.
Members often talk about Friday work rolling into Saturday mornings, the so-called “fraturday” shift.
Union members are also unhappy that many discounted pay rates agreed with streaming services when they were new players on the production scene are still in force despite the explosive growth of those firms.
“Flash forward 12 years later and streaming is obviously the thing, it’s the main game in town and it’s the future but it’s also the present,” said Gene Maddaus of Variety magazine.
“Big budget stuff is happening under these lower wage contracts and major streaming companies are using these lower wages and the unions are saying this is basically a loophole at this point.”
It is 14 years since writers in Hollywood went on strike for 14 weeks, a shutdown that was estimated to have cost the industry hundreds of millions of dollars.
This strike would be far more wide-ranging, with members from almost every area and stage of production. A handful of TV firms on different contracts would not be affected.
The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents the major studios, said it has put forward an offer to meet the union’s demands. Negotiations are likely to continue even if IATSE members vote “yes”.
“We love our jobs and know we are lucky to have them,” said Peyton Skelton, “but these things need to be addressed.”
Hip hop mogul Sean “Diddy” Combs has lost a bid to delay his upcoming sex-trafficking trial by two months.
US district judge Arun Subramanian said the 55-year-old rapper made his request too close to his trial, which is due to start next month.
Jury selection is currently scheduled for 5 May with opening statements set to be heard seven days later.
Combs has pleaded not guilty to five criminal counts including racketeering and sex trafficking.
Prosecutors with the Manhattan US attorney’s office accuse Combs of using his business empire to sexually abuse women between 2004 and 2024.
Combs’s lawyers say the sexual activity described by prosecutors was consensual.
In a court filing on Wednesday, Combs’s lawyer Marc Agnifilo asked Mr Subramanian to delay the trial because he needed more time to prepare his defence to two new charges which were brought on 4 April.
The charges were of sex trafficking and transportation to engage in prostitution.
Mr Agnifilo also said his team needs extra time to review emails it wants an alleged victim to turn over.
The new allegations brought the total number of criminal charges against the rap mogul to five – following the three original counts, which also included racketeering conspiracy, filed in September.
Federal prosecutors were opposed to any delay, writing in a Thursday court filing that the additional charges brought
earlier this month did not amount to substantially new conduct.
They also said Combs was not entitled to the alleged victim’s communications.
Read more: Everything you need to know about the Sean Combs trial
A sketch of Combs during one of his court appearances. Pic: Reuters
Meanwhile, Mr Subramanian is weighing other evidentiary issues, such as whether to allow alleged victims to testify under pseudonyms.
Also known during his career as Puff Daddy and P Diddy, Combs founded Bad Boy Records and is credited with helping turn rappers and R&B singers such as Notorious B.I.G, Mary J. Blige, Faith Evans and Usher into stars in the 1990s and 2000s.
But prosecutors have said his success concealed a dark side.
They say his alleged abuse included having women take part in recorded sexual performances called “freak-offs” with male sex workers, who were sometimes transported across state lines.
Combs has been in jail in Brooklyn since September, having been denied bail.
He also faces dozens of civil lawsuits by women and men who have accused him of sexual abuse.
Combs has strenuously denied all allegations of wrongdoing.
About 10,000 pages of records related to the assassination of Robert F Kennedy (RFK) nearly 60 years ago have been released publicly for the first time.
The senator, who was the brother of US president John F Kennedy (JFK), was shot dead at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles on 6 June 1968, moments after giving his victory speech for winning California’s Democratic presidential primary.
His assassin, Sirhan Sirhan, was convicted of first-degree murder and is serving life in prison.
RFK’s assassination, much like his brother’s in 1963, has been the subject of much speculation.
His son, Robert F Kennedy Jr, previously said he believed his father was killed by multiple gunmen, an assertion that contradicts official accounts.
After the documents were released on Friday, director of national intelligence Tulsi Gabbard said they would “shine a long-overdue light on the truth”.
Many files related to the senator’s assassination had already been released, but the ones posted to the US National Archives and Records Administration on Friday had not been digitised and sat for decades in storage facilities maintained by the federal government.
The move is a continuation of the release of historic withheld files ordered by US President Donald Trump, in an apparent bid to prove the transparency of his administration.
Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player
Trump announcing release of JFK files in March
It started when he signed an executive order back in January for the release of thousands of files about JFK’s assassination, many of which were made public in March.
The files gave readers more details about the US’s covert operations during the Cold War-era, but did not lend legitimacy to any of the many conspiracy theories surrounding the former president’s death.
Read more:
Robert F Kennedy Jr: Who is Donald Trump’s health chief?
Trump teases date for ‘even more important’ second UK state visit
RFK Jr, who is also Mr Trump’s health secretary, commended the president and Ms Gabbard for their “courage” and “dogged efforts” to release the files.
“Lifting the veil on the RFK papers is a necessary step toward restoring trust in American government,” he said in a statement.
In a statement, Ms Gabbard said: “Nearly 60 years after the tragic assassination of senator Robert F Kennedy, the American people will, for the first time, have the opportunity to review the federal government’s investigation thanks to the leadership of president Trump.”
Lawyers for RFK’s killer have been pushing for his release for decades, saying he is unlikely to reoffend or pose a danger to society.
A parole board deemed Sirhan suitable for release in 2022, but California governor Gavin Newsom rejected the decision in 2022, keeping him in state prison.
A different panel denied him release in 2023, saying he still lacked insight into what caused him to shoot RFK.
Donald Trump has said his second state visit to the UK could take place in September.
Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer handed over an invitation from the King when he visited Washington in February.
Trump teases return to UK – latest updates
Buckingham Palace previously only said the visit would happen “when diaries allow”, but Mr Trump told reporters on Thursday: “I think they are setting a date for September.”
“I don’t know how it can be bigger than the last one,” he said.
“The last one was incredible, but they say the next one will be even more important.”
Sir Keir Starmer handed Trump the invite earlier this year. Pic: PA
Mr Trump will become the only elected political leader in modern times to be invited to two state visits by a British monarch.
The president called the UK a “great country” in his comments at the White House on Thursday and said it was “an honour to be a friend of King Charles and the family, William”.
His first state visit was in 2019, when he was hosted by the late Queen.
Second-term US presidents who have already made a state visit usually get tea or lunch with the monarch at Windsor Castle, as was the case for George W Bush and Barack Obama.
Read more from Sky News:
Four killed as cable car crashes to ground near Naples
Two dead and five injured in shooting at Florida university
The president was hosted by the Queen in June 2019. Pic: Reuters
But Mr Trump is set to get all the pomp and ceremony laid on again in his honour – with another state banquet likely at Buckingham Palace.
The Royal Family‘s soft power diplomacy is viewed as a way of currying favour with the president, who’s known for his love of the monarchy and links to the UK through his mother, who was born on the Isle of Lewis in Scotland.
It comes as the government seeks an economic deal with the US, in the hope of potentially lessening the impact of the president’s tariffs.
-
Sports2 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports1 year agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports1 year agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports4 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business3 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway