At the Morelia International Film Festival, Oscar-winning actress Jessica Chastain covered up what many Hollywood stars have been unable to achieve for months: she took to the stage in red shade and took part in a conference, a regular event, before being hosted. a historical huelga of actors that lasted 100 days on Saturday.
The role of the Alliance of Television and Radio Actors (SAG-AFTRA) is currently the largest in its organization, and thanks to the breakdown of negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP by its English acronym), it is hanging on as far as the eye can see. You’ve tracked the events of the second half of the year, which are usually the studios’ strongest students at awards time, elevated to the September Emmy Awards stage change to black, and some fear their consequences may feel included. The Oscars are expected to be presented in March 2024.
But Chastain, like countless actors, showed character in his posturing and demands to improve his team’s performance.
“First of all, let’s negotiate, and that can only happen when both sides come to the table,” I told Chastain on Saturday at a business conference in front of the red shadow of Mexican director Michel Franco’s film Memento, which stars playing alongside Peter Sarsgaard.
“We’ve spent 100 days in color, we don’t even have it, but we’ll get it done and we won’t get it done quickly unless we have a fair contract,” Chastain added.
The star noted that her demands, which include higher economic compensation, protection against artificial intelligence and larger gifts from some of the streaming services, are viable in some urgent cases.
“87% of my union is unsafe, 87% of my union is less than $26,000 a year, a lot of these things need to change,” I say. “If it is possible to record, it is possible that the film that Michel and I decided to make had as many as 50 producers involved who could have worked on it… The miracle of preliminary ideas (like the one that brought them to Morelia) is that that it allows people to come to work, the only ones who don’t have to work now are AMPTP and they have to get back to the table.”
SAG-AFTRA sponsors also support the filming of numerous Hollywood productions produced by independent companies not affiliated with AMPTP. The bottom line is that the products must accept the terms proposed last time in negotiations, which include a new minimum wage rate that is 11% higher than the previous one.
The film Chastain is talking about is a new collaboration with the late Memento director, in which he also plays Mexican bailiff Isaac Hernandez, and was shot in San Francisco and Mexico, and “we’re planning more,” Franco says.
“I love being in Mexico, I love filming here,” Chastain said. “Because I lived in Mexico a little bit when I was a little girl, my abuela lived in Mexico, so I really love being here.”
Memento was shown at the last Venice Film Festival, where it won the Volpi Cup for Best Actor for Sarsgaard. It was also included in the official selection of the Toronto International Film Festival. He introduces Sylvia (Chastain) to an alcoholic who has spent 13 years sober and whose life has changed after meeting Saul (Sarsgaard) through the reunion of former partners who left her with memories of sexual abuse when she was a teenager. . Saul suffers from dementia and appears to be obsessed with Sylvia.
“This is a person who refuses to be in this state, who continues to live every day according to his life to the fullest,” Sarsgaard said. “From someone I really didn’t want to play to someone I admired, I learned a lot about this person.”
This is Franco’s third film written in English, after Sunset and Chronicle. In the case of Memento, he continues to be interested in the characters who are leaders of others, who are usually in the shadows in different films. In Chronicle, Tim Roth plays a terminally ill patient; in Memoir, Chastain plays a social worker serving adults with different abilities.
“I love writing and focusing on people who are invisible in society,” Franco said. “I’m more interested in broken people, people who don’t want to be perfect and shine in society, I can’t stand selfish people, I hate perfection and I’m more interested in vulnerable people. ”
The film was shot in New York by a production team that included many directors from the Mexican department, including clothing, art, editing and makeup.
“It feels like a real holiday to be at home and know so many dear people, this is my homeland,” Franco said.