SAG Member Alert on the Non-Union Production May Halt THE HOBBIT

More bad news for THE HOBBIT. Last we heard in June of this year, Peter Jackson was considering directing the two HOBBIT films himself after Guillermo del Toro left the project due to MGM’s financial problems and consequent delays. The Screen Actors Guild has released this news on their website.

The makers of feature film The Hobbit – to be shot in New Zealand next year – have refused to engage performers on union-negotiated agreements.

Members of Canadian Actors Equity, US Actors Equity, the Screen Actors Guild, UK Actors Equity, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, the Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance (Australia) and the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists are advised not to accept work on this non-union production.

If you are contacted to be engaged on The Hobbit please notify your union immediately.

It continued by saying:

For some years performers in New Zealand have struggled on non-union contracts. These contracts provide no minimum guarantees of wages or working conditions, no residual payments and no cancellation payments in the event the performer’s contract is cancelled. In 2006, at the request of New Zealand performers, the Australian union, the Media Entertainment & Arts Alliance (Alliance) opened an office in New Zealand.

Since that time the New Zealand branch of the Alliance has sought to negotiate with both individual producers and with the producers’ association but to no avail.

The International Federation of Actors (FIA), of which the vast majority of performer unions around the world are members, resolved that the time had come for performers around the world to support their colleagues in New Zealand and seek a union contract for all performers on The Hobbit.

At a recent meeting FIA decided that the situation had persisted long enough and that it was time for action to be taken.

Consequently, FIA resolved as follows:

“Resolved, that the International Federation of Actors urges each of its affiliates to adopt instructions to their members that no member of any FIA affiliate will agree to act in the theatrical film The Hobbit until such time as the producer has entered into a collective bargaining agreement with the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance for production in New Zealand providing for satisfactory terms and conditions for all performers employed on the productions.”

All this comes on the heels of Friday mornings press release that Screen Actors Guild, AFTRA AND AMPTP will commence negotiations, under a press blackout, on successor agreements to the AFTRA Exhibit A (Primetime TV) and SAG TV/Theatrical contracts on Monday, September 27, 2010.

 Man, will these two movie ever be made?