Excepting "fact 1", those aren't facts--those are your opinions.
Equity isn't a for profit organization--how can you favor the money making producers over a union that is trying to make for better working conditions and wages. The average actor salary is $17,000 a year--which isn't crap! And using non-union performers is just as greedy and cheap as taking jobs away from Americans in factories just because the sweatshops overseas are cheaper. The conditions for non-union actors are TERRIBLE--low pay, crappy housing, no days off, load in of scenery, high medical premiums, etc etc etc. This drains a performer's emotions--and when that happens, they can't possibly give a great performance. Talent aside, non-union shows rarely stand up to the same level of quality that a union show provides--Broadway is unionized. Off-Broadway is unionized. The National Tours you mostly saw years ago were unionized. Much of what is out there is not--and audiences are not happy about it. They are fooled into paying the SAME ticket prices for the shows thinking they are getting Broadway level quality. They are not. Actor salaries are the smallest precentage in a show's budget--even when star salaries are factored in. What's the deal? BOTTOM LINE. Tours are to Broadway what Cable is to Film--free profits at the expense of actors. This is unacceptable. This is why there should not be non-union tours.
But, here are some quotes for your fact finding fancy:
The AFL-CIO has added the non-Equity road production of the musical “Miss Saigon” to its national boycott list at the request of the Actors’ Equity Association (AEA), the union representing 45,000 stage actors and stage managers in live productions.
A production of Big League Theatricals, Miss Saigon is the company’s second road show on the AFL-CIO boycott list. The road production of “The Music Man” went on the list in August 2001.
Actors’ Equity has mounted a national campaign under the slogan “Fair Wages All Stages” to publicize the growing problem of non-Equity road shows produced by Big League Theatricals and other companies. Equity President Patrick Quinn reports that Equity actors worked 21,000 weeks on tour over the past year, compared to some 44,000 weeks on tour five years ago. “There is a crisis on the road and Equity has taken steps to address it,” Quinn said. He noted that Big League Theatricals was charging similar ticket prices as Equity shows without similar wages and benefits. According to the union, producers believe that there is more money to be made on the road than on Broadway. Consequently, they are increasingly entering into licensing agreements with non-Equity producers to avoid contractual agreements for Equity shows. “Actors and stage managers in these non-Equity productions receive very small salaries and negligible per-diems and health insurance packages,” Quinn said.
Regarding the Equity health benefits (this is just a small portion of the information available at
http://www.actorsequity.org :
Your dues to Equity do not in any way, shape, or form, go to health insurance. Health insurance is an amount paid weekly by your employer to the Equity-League Pension and Health Fund, which by law is a totally separate entity from the union.
"If we're losing so much money, why don't we buy cheaper insurance?"
The Trustees have already made the difficult decision to do so. On October 1st, we will switch from the Union Labor Life Insurance Company/Blue Cross/Beech Street combo, to complete medical and prescription drug coverage from CIGNA, which will save the fund $2 million dollars annually. This is a financial boon, but was a difficult decision because the Trustees recognized that some participants would have to change doctors because of the switch of insurance carriers. However, because CIGNA's PPO network is so large, it will contain many doctors who were also providers on the previous insurance plans.
"So then, if we're saving $2 million bucks, why did we have to increase our eligibility?"
Because $2 million dollars is only 1/8th of $16 million dollars, the present annual deficit, and that is how much we have to save to break even. To eliminate that current deficit, we had to find ways to save another $14 million dollars. To keep the Plan from collapse, increasing the eligibility was the only major option. And remember, these savings will not be immediate, but will take at least a year to have any meaningful effect on the deficit. Until that time, the red ink will continue to flow.
And from NYTIMES:
Actors Rally to Protest Non-Equity Road Shows
By JASON ZINOMAN
Published: October 30, 2003
even months after the Broadway musicians' strike, another battle is brewing between organized labor and theatrical producers.
Hundreds of members of Actors' Equity Association, the union for actors and stage managers, fired an opening salvo in a rally in Duffy Square yesterday, protesting the use of non-Equity touring companies. This is shaping up as the most contentious issue in coming negotiations between the union and producers. Their contract expires in June.
"Our union is being eroded," said Denis O'Hare, who won a Tony this year for his role in "Take Me Out." "Health benefits are hurt, and actors on the road are not getting a decent wage." The union says that pay in non-Equity touring companies can be as little as a third of that for Broadway actors. Mr. O'Hare said union members were "angry enough to go on strike" when their contract expires.
Equity has three goals, said Maria Somma, a union spokeswoman: to unionize non-Equity shows, "to encourage that future road shows are all Equity and to let the League of American Producers know that everyone in Equity is serious about the road issue."
Producers say that touring costs are so high that shows often aren't profitable for theaters, and many say that audiences don't notice the difference between Equity and non-Equity actors.
Daniel Sher, executive producer of Big League Theatricals, which is producing non-Equity tours of "Miss Saigon" and "The Music Man," said in a telephone interview that it was difficult for presenters to make their money back on an Equity show that wasn't a recent Broadway blockbuster like "Hairspray" or "Mamma Mia!"
"We just brought `Miss Saigon' to the Landmark Theater in Richmond, Va., for a week, and the theater lost $90,000," Mr. Sher said.
Some actors at the rally said they saw serious long-term effects from non-Equity productions. "This issue doesn't affect most New York actors, because we haven't been on the road in a while," said Hunter Foster, star of "Little Shop of Horrors." "But if the road keeps going non-Equity, who's to say that won't happen on Broadway?"
Among those at the rally were André De Shields, Tony Roberts and Kathleen Chalfant. Speakers included the president of the A.F.L.-C.I.O., John J. Sweeney; the president of the New York City Central Labor Council, Assemblyman Brian M. McLaughlin; and the actors Hugh Jackman and Sandy Duncan.
There was also a performance of "The Jobless Chronicles," a one-act musical revue produced by Actors' Equity that is touring the country to promote labor solidarity.
WSS2--please stick all this in your pipe and smoke it. =)
Updated On: 10/30/03 at 10:27 PM
