The Hobbit Debacle

"Filming of The Hobbit moving overseas"

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10682024

Well congratulations, Actors Equity. You've almost managed to become less popular than Paul Henry. What I don't get is, what on earth made you think you a) spoke for all NZ actors and b) would get any sort of positive outcome from this whole affair?

18 months ago, producers of The Hobbit offered Actors Equity the chance to revise "The Pink Book", the industry standards and guidelines document used as a basis for the treatment of actors in NZ. Apparently, they didn't hear a peep out of the "union"... until we all did. Now, according to the latest release from actors (http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10682058), they say they are happy for the issue to be decided through updating the Pink Book. Nobody has an answer as to why this didn't happen last year.

From what I've been able to find out - which, despite actually going to an Actors Equity meeting and digging around both local and international websites, is surprisingly little - Actors Equity, by which we are really saying MEAA, Australia's Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance, feel that NZ actors are getting screwed out of "residual" payments (basically a share of the back end profits), or something. Originally I heard the dispute was over residual payments for actors who didn't fulfill their contracts (were fired or quit).

Strangely enough, what with the Boycott order being so public, and given that actors are in the public eye by profession, Artists Equity and MEAA have been very secretive about what it is they specifically have an issue with. Perhaps if they had been more open, public opinion wouldn't have been so strongly against them. The latest release simply states they want "basic terms and conditions such as hours, breaks, overtime payments etc".

Whether actors really would be getting screwed over if they signed on to The Hobbit under the currently offered contracts, I don't know. I don't think there are many people who do. What I do know, however, is that an awful lot of people, not just actors but technicians, caterers, laborers, artists and artisans, drivers, hotels - the list goes on - who are now going to miss out on some very valuable work.

Actors who weren't happy with their contract have always been able to say "No thanks", which is what they're effectively doing now. If you don't get the work because you decide the contract isn't good enough for you, or if you don't get the work because the production is no longer being made in NZ, you're in the same position - not working.

Given the response of "up to 1500" Wellington technicians, actors etc who marched on an Actors Equity meeting last night as well as the strongly worded online shit-storms which have cluttered comments sections on articles relating to the issue, it's pretty clear that everyone else involved in the Hobbit besides actors would much rather have the choice whether to accept contracts or not.

Sigh. What a mess. What a pathetic, petty, childish, confusing, needless mess. Thank god I'm not an actor.

However, this blog is called Media Lashes and the NZ media definitely deserve a taste of the old cat-o-nine-tails for their dismal reporting on the issue. Sure, the fluffy stuff - the increasingly nasty back-and-forth media releases, the protests, the threats, the endless comment - fills up the column inches real easy like. But, as has happened with teachers, junior doctors, radiographers etc, information on the ACTUAL point or points of contention is sorely lacking.

Intentional or not, unions are consistently portrayed as money grubbing shit stirrers - and a big part of that is due to the actual requests and offers made by either side taking a backseat to "newsworthy" parts of the story - threats of industrial action, strikes, protests etc. Indeed, to get any sort of attention a union pretty much HAS to threaten a strike. Then, as the public isn't informed what the actual problem/s are, the union looks overreactive, greedy and bullying.

I understand that often the parties try to keep negotiation specifics under their hats, but as journalists it is your JOB to look beyond the media releases and find out what is really going on. And whenever you get those specifics, they should be a major part of the story. In order to present the issue in an unbiased manner, journalists need to dig deeper and get as close to the facts as possible - and present those facts to the reader. Like what the situation is, what the demands are, what the offers are, what the points of contention are and what the likely outcome will be, given historical precedent and the current context. PLEASE?