US Strikes Impact On Global Production: Whose Stories Are We Telling Anyway?
So there I was thinking that Streamlined could safely take a few months off over the summer – nothing big was likely to happen; instead of which Hollywood has gone on strike, the world is on fire (not in a good way), and a brilliant marketing gimmick has convinced everyone to visit the cinema twice in one weekend. In many countries, at least in Hong Kong where I am right now, the thought of spending a combined five hours in an air-conditioned space where you don’t have to pay the electricity bill would be attractive even if they were showing re-runs of every film in the Transformers franchise. Movie marketers take note – climate change could be your best friend.
But while the blanket coverage of ‘Barbenheimer’ and the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes would have us believe otherwise, life is continuing much as normal in most of the world’s entertainment industries. Here in Asia, there will be limited disruption to the autumn film festival circuit and production schedules. Very few Asian festivals rely on Hollywood stars to draw audiences and sponsors (although the big Gulf festivals such as Red Sea are perhaps a different story). And while a growing number of Asian countries have introduced cash incentives to draw Hollywood and other international production, very few have so far attracted a large volume of shoots.
The big exception is Thailand, and looking at current events in Bangkok, we can see some of the potential pitfalls in becoming too dependent on Hollywood production (not that Thailand is in that position yet, as noted below). Noah Hawley’s Alien series was less than a week away from the start of production for Disney’s FX network when the SAG-AFTRA strike was called. The crew had been in pre-production for around four months and had booked out most of the sound stages, camera and lighting equipment in Bangkok.
If the production had been shut down, more than 400 Thai crew would have lost their jobs. And while Streamlined believes labour rights are a global issue, the Thai crew might have been justified in wondering, whether the US actors win or lose, would it make any difference to working practices in Thailand? Which guilds are fighting for Thai workers? And if the strike continues, will it make Thailand a more attractive destination for US studios looking to circumvent SAG and the WGA? Would that be a good or a bad thing for Thailand in the long run?
