The Hollywood actors strikes appears to be over. Here’s what happens now
After an industry-wide shutdown lasting 118 days, it looks like it’s finally time to call “Action!” in Hollywood once again.
US actors’ union SAG-AFTRA has now agreed a “tentative deal” with Hollywood studio bosses, with picket locations now officially closed.
The announcement comes after the Writers Guild of America (WGA) agreed a deal in September following the separate 148-day writers strike.
There are a couple of steps that need to happen before the deal becomes official, with the national SAG-AFTRA board set to review the agreement before details are released and the guild’s full membership takes a vote.
However, when striking screenwriters reached their deal in September, writing work was allowed to resume before full ratification of the contract was complete.
As Hollywood looks set to get back to work, here’s what to expect.
Film and TV production
Production is likely to resume on Deadpool 3, starring Ryan Reynolds. Pic: AP
Production on films and TV shows is expected to start momentarily following the end of the strike. But while the deal means work can now resume, don’t expect a flurry of shows and films to come out straight away – after a delay of several months it will take time for the industry to get back to normal, and viewers may continue to feel the effects for months, if not years.
Much-anticipated films including Deadpool 3, starring Ryan Reynolds and Hugh Jackman, and Ridley Scott’s Gladiator sequel will likely be among the first films that will resume production.
Work on season five of hit ’80s sci-fi series Stranger Things was also paused, and the cast of Wicked, which includes Ariana Grande and Jonathan Bailey, were days away from completing the film before the announcement.
Stranger Things was among the hit shows put on hold during the strikes. Pic: Tina Rowden/Netflix
Production on upcoming seasons of other hit shows, including The Handmaid’s Tale and The Last Of Us, was also put on hold.
The resolution of the writers strike allowed script work to resume on shows such as Abbott Elementary, The White Lotus and Yellowjackets – and this head-start might help those productions get back on the air sooner once their stars are cleared to work.
Television moves faster than film – as one once filming ends on films there is still a lengthy editing and promotional process.
In recent weeks before the announcement of the resolution, more shows and films announced delays – Kevin Costner’s final episodes of Yellowstone won’t air until November 2024, and the next Mission: Impossible film has also been postponed.
Red carpet glam
Oppenheimer stars Rami Malek, Matt Damon, Emily Blunt, Florence Pugh and Cillian Murphy had to walk out of the UK premiere as the strike was announced
It wasn’t just work on production itself that was put on hold – members of SAG-AFTRA, which represents around 160,000 workers in the industry, were also barred from publicising any of their upcoming projects.
This means that for months, film and TV premieres have either been called off, or gone ahead without their stars, and you will have seen very few actors giving interviews about their acting work. Striking actors were even warned not to dress up as popular film or TV characters at Halloween.
The much-anticipated premiere of Christopher Nolan’s epic Oppenheimer was scheduled on 14 July, the day the actors strike was announced – forcing stars including Cillian Murphy, Emily Blunt and Matt Damon to walk off the red carpet.
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Sky News speaks to Oppenheimer stars shortly before strike announcement
Now, promo can go ahead as planned – so we’re expecting to see a flurry of red carpet announcements as studios rush to show off their stars once again.
The strike also affected international film festivals such as Venice and Toronto – and during the London Film Festival in October, director Martin Scorsese said he was “disappointed” that the stars of his latest film, Killers Of The Flower Moon, including Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro, could not attend.
The end of the strike means festivals such as Sundance, Berlin and Cannes can go ahead as planned at the beginning of 2024.
Some projects were given exemptions, such as Michael Mann’s upcoming racing drama Ferrari, for which stars Adam Driver and Patrick Dempsey were able to attend the Venice Film Festival – and also allowed Dempsey to do an interview with People magazine when it named him its Sexiest Man Alive.
Does this affect the Oscars or other awards shows?
The Emmy Awards, which usually take place in September, were called off due to the strikes. A new date was set for 15 January, and it looks like the ceremony will now be able to go ahead on this date.
As most of the awards ceremonies take place between January and April, events including the big one, the Oscars, can now take place as planned without any changes.
What does the deal mean?
SAG-AFTRA says the deal is worth more than a billion dollars and includes compensation increases, consent protections for use of artificial intelligence and actors’ likenesses, and a “streaming participation bonus”.
The Association of Motion Picture and Television Producers says the “tentative agreement represents a new paradigm”, and that studios are offering actors “the biggest contract-on-contract gains in the history of the union, including the largest increase in minimum wages in the last 40 years”.
Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, SAG-AFTRA’s executive director and chief negotiator, says the gains have made the strike worthwhile.
What’s next?
Well… it might not all be over just yet. In fact, there could be another actors strike – this time by video game performers. Negotiations for this contract are ongoing, but a shutdown has been authorised.
Actors who work on video games range from voice performers to stunt performers, and like SAG-AFTRA members have expressed concerns about the use of AI in their industry.
Studios will also be negotiating with set workers and their guild, the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, in 2024. IATSE members work on everything from set-building to lighting and creating effects, and so are crucial to film and television production. They have been severely impacted by the filming shutdown already, with some members joining the picket lines in the writers and actors strikes.
And other sectors of the industry have moved to unionise as the actors and writers strikes have played out. Some reality television workers are calling for a union, while visual effects artists who work on Marvel films voted to join IATSE.
So while Hollywood loves a happy ending, there could be a sequel to come.
Video footage has shown the moment singer and actress Ariana Grande was accosted by a fan at a film premiere.
Ms Grande was in Singapore for the debut of Wicked: For Good when the incident unfolded on Thursday.
The video captured the moment the fan scaled the barricade and pushed past photographers towards Ms Grande.
Pic: tacotrvck_vb/X/via REUTERS
He then threw his arms around her, before co-star Cynthia Erivo intervened and security swoops in to stop him.
The man, now identified as Johnson Wen, 26, is reportedly a notorious red carpet crasher.
Wen, who has since been charged with being a public nuisance, goes by the nickname Pyjama Man, and gloated as he shared footage of the intrusion online.
“Dear Ariana Grande, Thank You for letting me Jump on the Yellow Carpet with You,” he wrote on Instagram.
Pic: tacotrvck_vb/X/via REUTERS
In video stories posted to the site beforehand, he was seen at the Universal Studios venue, revealing his intentions.
In one, he said: “I feel like I’m in a dream, that’s my best friend, Ariana Grande, and I’m gonna meet her. I’ve been dreaming about that.”
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The Australian has ambushed several performers on stage, according to reports, including Katy Perry and The Chainsmokers at concerts in Sydney, and The Weeknd in Melbourne.
It has been reported that Wen intends to plead guilty and that he could face a fine of more than £1,000.
Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo at the London premiere for Wicked: For Good
Ms Grande took a moment to gather herself in the aftermath of the intrusion, visibly shocked by the incident.
She didn’t address the incident on her own Instagram, but shared some photos with the caption “thank you, Singapore”, adding “we love you”.
The singer battled post-traumatic stress disorder after her 2017 concert in Manchester was bombed, leaving 22 people dead.
She told Vogue in 2018: “It’s hard to talk about because so many people have suffered such severe, tremendous loss. But, yeah, it’s a real thing.
“I know those families and my fans, and everyone there experienced a tremendous amount of it as well. Time is the biggest thing.
“I feel like I shouldn’t even be talking about my own experience – like I shouldn’t even say anything. I don’t think I’ll ever know how to talk about it and not cry.”
In the same interview she also addressed her own anxiety, saying she has “always” had it.
Ms Grande plays Galinda Upland in Wicked: For Good, the character who becomes Glinda the Good Witch. Ms Erivo plays Elphaba, the character who becomes the Wicked Witch of the West.
The film is released in UK cinemas on 21 November.
Entertainment
A third of daily music uploads are AI-generated and 97% of people can’t tell the difference, says report
Do you care if the music you’re listening to is artificially generated?
That question – once the realm of science fiction – is becoming increasingly urgent.
An AI-generated country track, Walk My Walk, is currently sitting at number one on the US Billboard chart of digital sales and a new report by streaming platform Deezer has revealed the sheer scale of AI production in the music industry.
Deezer’s AI-detection system found that around 50,000 fully AI-generated tracks are now uploaded every day, accounting for 34% of all daily uploads.
File pic: iStock
The true number is most likely higher, as Deezer’s AI-detection system does not catch every AI-generated track. Nor does this figure include partially AI-generated tracks.
In January 2025, Deezer’s system identified 10% of uploaded tracks as fully AI-generated.
Since then, the proportion of AI tracks – made using written prompts such as “country, 1990s style, male singer” – has more than tripled, leading the platform’s chief executive, Alexis Lanternier, to say that AI music is “flooding music streaming”.
‘Siphoning money from royalty pool’
What’s more, when Deezer surveyed 9,000 people in eight countries – the US, Canada, Brazil, UK, France, Netherlands, Germany and Japan – and asked them to detect whether three tracks were real or AI, 97% could not tell the difference.
That’s despite the fact that the motivation behind the surge of AI music is not in the least bit creative, according to Deezer. The company says that roughly 70% of fully AI-generated tracks are what it calls “fraudulent” – that is, designed purely to make money.
“The common denominator is the ambition to boost streams on specific tracks in order to siphon money from the royalty pool,” a Deezer spokesperson told Sky News.
“With AI-generated content, you can easily create massive amounts of tracks that can be used for this purpose.”
File pic: Reuters
The tracks themselves are not actually fraudulent, Deezer says, but the behaviour around them is. Someone will upload an AI track then use an automated system – a bot – to listen to a song over and over again to make royalties from it.
Even though the total number of streams for each individual track is very low – Deezer estimates that together they account for 0.5% of all streams – the work needed to make an AI track is so tiny that the rewards justify the effort.
Are fully-AI tracks being removed?
Deezer is investing in AI-detection software and has filed two patents for systems that spot AI music. But it is not taking down the tracks it marks as fully-AI.
Instead it removes them from algorithmic recommendations and editorial playlists, a measure designed to stop the tracks getting streams and therefore generating royalties, and marks the tracks as “AI-generated content”.
“If people want to listen to an AI-generated track however, they can and we are not stopping them from doing so – we just want to make sure they are making a conscious decision,” the Deezer spokesperson says.
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Deezer’s survey found that more than half (52%) of respondents felt uncomfortable with not being able to tell the difference between AI and human-made music.
“The survey results clearly show that people care about music and want to know if they’re listening to AI or human-made tracks or not,” said the company’s boss Alexis Lanternier.
“There’s also no doubt that there are concerns about how AI-generated music will affect the livelihood of artists.”
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Musicians protests AI copyright plans
Earlier this year, more than 1,000 musicians – including Annie Lennox, Damon Albarn and Kate Bush – released a silent album to protest plans by the UK government to let artificial intelligence companies use copyright-protected work without permission.
A recent study commissioned by the International Confederation of Societies of Authors and Composers suggested that generative AI music could be worth £146bn a year in 2028 and account for around 60% of music libraries’ revenues.
By this metric, the authors concluded, 25% of creators’ revenues are at risk by 2028, a sum of £3.5bn.
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