As a seasoned gamer with countless hours spent immersed in various digital worlds, I find the real-world events unfolding in Hollywood intriguing, especially when it comes to the unionization of intimacy coordinators.
The industry’s intimacy coordinators have spoken: They want to unionize with SAG-AFTRA.
On Tuesday, a tally of votes conducted by the National Labor Relations Board revealed that every intimacy coordinator taking part chose to affiliate with the 160,000-strong performers’ union, SAG-AFTRA. The exact number of intimacy coordinators who participated in the election remains undisclosed at this time.
During these challenging periods, where environmental safety and women’s rights face significant risks, it’s encouraging to notice the entertainment industry acknowledging intimacy coordinators and their crucial roles in productions and for actors in intimate scenes,” said union president Fran Drescher in a statement. “We at SAG-AFTRA are proud to welcome this distinguished team of trained professionals as the latest addition to our membership.
The Hollywood Reporter contacted the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to seek their response.
The vote signifies the peak of the connection between these team members and the union, which has made efforts to make their role more professional since it gained prominence following the #MeToo movement. Intimacy coordinators, who arrange intimate and sexually explicit scenes, have traditionally been part of theater productions. However, they became increasingly common on film and TV sets from 2018, when HBO pledged to employ an intimacy coordinator for all intimate scenes in their projects. Subsequently, Netflix, Amazon, Hulu, and Starz also implemented this practice.
Back in 2020, SAG-AFTRA started closely examining the role due to the fact that their members are the ones visibly performing highly exposed work, as stated by then-union president Gabrielle Carteris to THR. In the same year, they released guidelines for the role and accredited several training programs focusing on intimacy coordinators. Fast forward to 2022, SAG-AFTRA’s National Board showed interest in incorporating this group into their union. Two years after that, in 2024, SAG-AFTRA filed a request for a union election with the NLRB.
Following Tuesday’s vote, the union and the AMPTP will be able to start negotiations for their initial contract, unless there are any objections filed with the NLRB before the results are officially confirmed. Earlier, intimacy coordinators have expressed a desire to establish consistent wage rates and benefits.
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2024-11-13 02:24