The Animation Guild, TAG 839, continued ramping up negotiations with a third ‘March on the Boss’ to remind animation industry execs that members will stand together to achieve fair wages, job security, and guardrails around Generative AI use.
For the third time in less than a month, hundreds of The Animation Guild (TAG), IATSE Local 839 members gathered to deliver a petition - signed by more than 62,000 members and public supporters - to executives. Today’s “March on the Boss” took place at Burbank’s Warner Bros./Cartoon Network, as negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) are set to resume tomorrow, November 19, with the rest of the week earmarked for bargaining. The petition reminds bosses that while animation workers kept content production alive during the COVID lockdown, and animation is outperforming live-action on screens and in merchandise sales, they face unprecedented levels of unemployment.
TAG has been in negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) since August. To date, the Guild’s priority issues, such as fair wages, job security, and common-sense guardrails around Generative AI use, are still on the table. Following the delivery of petitions to Netflix on October 25 and DreamWorks Animation on November 12, this third such effort is part of a series of actions to show employers that TAG members will stand together for as long as it takes to get the contract they deserve.
Matt Braly, creator and showrunner, Amphibia, said, “As a community and as an industry, this is our leverage. This is our power to negotiate, and we have to exercise it, otherwise we’re going to be left in the dust. Nobody cares about this medium more than us. This is a clutch moment for us, a turning point. We are fighting for our livelihoods, our artforms, and our future.”
“Through the pandemic we basically held the entire entertainment industry aloft, and now they’re like, great, we’re going to get rid of all of you as much as we can,” said Owen Dennis, creator and showrunner, Infinity Train and Among Us. “We’re going to replace you with AI. They’ve openly said that. When they can’t replace people with AI, they’re trying to outsource to other studios in Canada and overseas. This is unsustainable. This is a middle-class lifestyle that we’re asking to live. These aren’t huge demands.”
Mary Nash, a background designer, shared, “I’ve been working since 2013, and schedules have been getting shorter and shorter over the years. Productions are not functional, and studios are looking to cut the people that they do have. Everything is about tax cuts for the studios instead of investing in the future. I thought at this point in my career, I would be able to have some consistency, and I have even less consistency in my life than I did in my 20s. This isn’t sustainable. I just want to be able to live. I want a middle-class life.”
“I worked in this [Warner Bros.] building for seven years,” Mike Ruocco, an animator, writer, and board artist added. “We watched shows get canceled left and right during the mergers, and it’s just sad, how many people are not working right now. We kept the entire industry afloat during the pandemic, and then got kicked to the curb. It’s not like we’re asking for the entire bank. We’re just asking for our fair share of what we deserve. Just to make a living at what we love, and work hard to do it.”
Negotiations resume November 19. More information can be found here.
Source: The Animation Guild
Dan Sarto is Publisher and Editor-in-Chief of Animation World Network.
