Their offer, confirmed by Clooney’s spokesperson on Thursday, would provide the union an extra $150 million over three years and could help fund improved health benefits.
Clooney also said top stars would only collect residuals once lower-paid actors received theirs.
“A lot of the top earners want to be part of the solution,” Clooney told Hollywood publication Deadline, which first reported the news. “We think it’s fair for us to pay more into the union.”
A SAG-AFTRA spokesperson did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Look, this is a super swell offer but George Clooney shouldn’t be bailing major studios out of their obligations. They can afford to settle the strike all on their own they just choose not to. Frankly, I think George should stop trying to score points for his generosity and grab a picket sign and make himself useful. He isn’t the problem but he’s not the fucking solution either.
The “top stars” are also hurting. They are more likely to be invested in films, or expecting big paydays to pay their big mortgages. So George and company may be willing to kick in some pocket change to clear the logjam.
Big actors are also producers/executive producers of everything they work on (unless is something like marvel I guess) and pretty sure the real money come from that. They have a conflict of interest on the strike.
Just because you personally benefit from the existing system doesn’t mean that you should accept it as OK the way it is, or that it is not capable of being changed to something better, and rejecting the existing system is always a choice. (I thought we went over this in the movie already!)
So, having a production company (I just want more of me on the credits OK?) doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t to march and picket and fight for what’s right.
It’d be a beautiful thing if the top Hollywood stars showed some real solidarity and started/used their own production companies to give SAG-AFTRA a fair deal and make some creative, original films. It’d probably scare big studios knowing there was money being made that they weren’t getting their cut of.
Yeah, while most big actors have put on an outward show of solidarity with the strikes, let’s not pretend they’re not basically in the same position as the studio execs
If he can offer 150 million, how bad is he really hurting?
That was kind of what I thought. While it’s nice he is doing this, he should have done it after the strike. This only serves to let the studios off the hook.
Plus when IATSE is next up to negotiate they’re going to get hosed because “not even SAG-AFTRA could get that”.