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Updated: October 28, 2023 @ 8:52 am
Media arts and design professor Imelda O’Reilly said the increasing amount of AI usage in film writing will have an effect on the availability of jobs for screenwriting professionals.
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Media arts and design professor Imelda O’Reilly said the increasing amount of AI usage in film writing will have an effect on the availability of jobs for screenwriting professionals.
Strikes in Hollywood, which left thousands of writers out of work for portions of the summer and actors still on the picket lines, are concerning film students at JMU.
The future of filmmaking is facing growing concerns because of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) and Writers Guild of America (WGA) strikes, which left thousands of writers out of work from May 2 to Sept. 27, while actors have still been out of work since July 14.
With traditional media consumption changing amid the rise of streaming, WGA went on strike over concerns with lack of residual payments — the form of payment a worker receives from a redistribution of their work on another network — which is similar to when the WGA struck 16 years ago, when DVDs were gaining popularity.
Junior Edwin Domachowski is the president of Doghouse Productions, a club that creates student-run short films. Domachowski intends to be a screenwriter after graduating and said he feels “uneasy” about the ambiguity of the industry. He said he’s had conversations with his parents over each of their concerns about planning a future in Hollywood because of the attention the strikes have put on some of the industry’s shortcomings.
From Harrisonburg to Hollywood, thousands of writers and actors have been affected by the Writer’s Guild of America and Screen Actors Guild strikes. Alexa Bonilla spoke with JMU Alumni to see how they are advocating for fairness in the industry on the picket lines.
The WGA reached a three-year deal with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), which represents 350 production companies, studios, streamers and networks such as Disney, NBCUniversal, Warner Bros-Discovery, Netflix and more. The deal resulted in set minimum staffing requirements for writers’ rooms, 20% bonuses for residual payments and an agreement that any script written by artificial intelligence (AI) will not be considered source material.
However, studios have retained the right to continue to train AI on writing scripts.
“Reading through the deal, I thought it was great,” Domachowksi said. “But I didn’t know it was only three years, which is scary looking into the future because [the strikes] could very well happen again, especially with AI advancing even more.”
Despite the AMPTP’s insistence on incorporating AI, Domachowski remained optimistic that the CEOs running the majority of the major production companies included in the deal will eventually move on from AI because of the lack of human connection it can create.
Media Arts & Design professor and independent filmmaker Imelda O’Reilly, who teaches film-centric classes such as screenwriting, is a European Film Academy and British Academy Film Awards connect member and said she has seen AI’s effect on her industry firsthand.
O’Reilly said many freelancers who work from job to job are “anxious” about their pay, especially since popular locations for filming, like New York City and Los Angeles, are expensive housing markets. She said this increased the need for the strike, saying she’s seen many people “pushed out” of those cities.
O’Reilly said the film industry is constantly “changing and reinventing itself” and the shifts are reflected in workers’ payment.
O’Reilly said film editors are already using AI to edit films, and she can understand why the technology is being used as a tool but said storytelling is “a lot more complex than people know” and that if you’re “worth your salt” as a filmmaker, you’ll probably have to go back and tweak an edit that AI made.
“I’m already experiencing that with my screenwriting class.” O’Reilly said. “I’m like, ‘Is this script generated by AI or by the students?’ I think that in terms of morality, some questions come up, but I think that comes down to the individual and what they choose for themselves.”
Junior theater major Luke Freisner, a former staff writer for The Breeze, said Hollywood is trending in a direction that is “lazy” and “less original” because of the hastiness of using AI. He pointed out stories of background actors getting their faces and bodies scanned so that production teams could use their image and likeness without them actually being present on set.
“The more that you can cut corners, the less people get paid,” Freisner said. “There’s a lot of concerns there as we’re not getting paid livable wages in general, and now, you’re trying to find ways to work around actually paying people, actually hiring people — where’s the end?”
As for the ongoing SAG-AFTRA strike, the guild met with the AMPTP on Tuesday. The AMPTP introduced a new solution to “success-based compensation,” a term that’s been coined to acknowledge actors’ needs for just payments, to the guild; however, negotiations “flopped.”
Prior to this meeting, the two groups last met on Oct. 11 but were unable to make an agreement because they remained too far apart on minimum wage agreements, protection over AI usage and a set fee for subscribers’ revenue to be funded to actors whose shows are on streaming services.
Student screenwriters like Domachowski are happy the WGA strike is over and have hope that they won’t have to strike again. But questions still arise about what the future could entail.
“Once I graduate, will I not be able to do what I want to do? Will I have to fight with all of these other amazing writers for livable wages?” Domachowski asked. “But I’m happy that they were able to reach an agreement, and I have hope that we won’t have to strike again to be able to get things that feel like basic human needs.”
Contact Hayden Hundley at [email protected]. For more coverage of JMU and Harrisonburg news, follow the news desk on X @BreezeNewsJMU.
Over 200 members of the JMU and Harrisonburg community gathered at the steps of Wilson Hall on Thursday for a vigil to support JMU’s Jewish community as conflict between Israel and Hamas continues. What shone through as the common theme of the night was to rely on mishpacha, the greater Jewish community.
Harrisonburg’s Urban Forestry Program collaborated with Keister Elementary School during a tree planting Friday. This is part of the city’s ongoing effort to increase greenery in the city, as well as to improve air quality, reduce urban noise, control stormwater runoff and enhance the beauty of urban landscapes.
Peggy Smith, the program administrator in the JMU Department of History for more than 10 years, was regarded as the “on-campus mom” by many students, known not only for her work ethic but also a willingness to be involved and help anyone she could. She was 56.
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