(New York) Several American film and television stars, including Breaking Bad star Bryan Cranston, took to the microphone on Tuesday to defend striking Hollywood actors at a rally in Times Square in New York.
“We won’t allow our jobs to be taken away and given to robots,” Bryan Cranston said as he spoke of his fears of artificial intelligence to a dense crowd of strikers and supporters gathered in this square in the heart of the Broadway theater district.
Sporting a flocked SAG-AFTRA Actors Union T-shirt with a raised fist, he delivered a message to Disney boss Bob Iger, a target of the movement: “We will not accept your depriving us of our right to work and earn a decent living.”
“Last and foremost, we won’t let you take our dignity,” concluded the man who plays the character of Walter White in Breaking Bad, the series that marked the history of television shows.
In the midst of the giant screens of Times Square – so often the support of promotions for new productions on streaming platforms – F. Murray Abraham, known for his roles in Amadeus (Oscar for best actor in 1984) or the series Homeland and The White Lotus, for his part defended trade unionism, “good for America”.
Other stars were present, such as Christine Baranski, Chloë Grace Moretz, Steve Buscemi, Brendan Fraser, Christian Slater, or Jessica Chastain, who was indignant, on July 18 on Twitter renamed X, that “87% of members of the SAG-AFTRA union earn less than 26,000 dollars a year” and are not eligible for health insurance.
“Where the fuck is my money!” “, launched, Liza Colon-Zayas, known for her role in the series The Bear. Last week, Ted Lasso star Jason Sudeikis also appeared on the picket line.
The actors have joined the screenwriters already on strike since July 14, after the failure of negotiations with the studios on their salaries and guarantees against artificial intelligence. According to them, it threatens their future, in particular generative AI, which makes it possible to easily create very realistic synthetic voices and images. This double social movement has not been seen for more than 60 years in Hollywood.
The guidelines of SAG-AFTRA, which represents 160,000 actors, stunt performers, dancers and other professionals on the small and big screen, prohibit all members from filming, but also from promoting their productions, in person or on social networks, seriously disrupting Hollywood.