Topline
Actor Ron Perlman had some choice words for a studio executive that told Deadline on Tuesday that the WGA strike should be allowed to drag on until unionizers start losing their apartments and houses, saying in a now-deleted Instagram post that “we know who said that, and where he f—ing lives,” advising the executive to “be careful.”
Key Facts
Perlman expressed his anger over studio executives’ coarse comments about WGA strikers, criticizing the anonymous executive who told Deadline: “The endgame is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses.”
Perlman said the comments amounted to wishing that “families starve,” adding the executive makes millions of dollars a year for “creating nothing.”
The actor, best known for his roles in Hellboy and Sons of Anarchy, concluded the video with a warning for the executive to “be really careful,” following his comment, saying, “that’s the kind of s— that stirs s— up.”
In the story Perlman referenced, other sources rehashed the comment, with another unnamed source calling it “a cruel but necessary evil.”
Key Background
The Writers Guild of America began its strike in early May, and there remains no end in sight as the union bargains for a new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, demanding greater pay and employment protections following a seismic industry-wide shift toward streaming production. Actors with the SAG-AFTRA union began picketing Friday after their contract with the studios expired. The strikes have received solidarity from Perlman, actor Sean Gunn and many others, including cast members of the highly anticipated atomic bomb drama Oppenheimer, who left the movie’s U.K. premiere Thursday after the actors’ strike was announced. The effects of the actors’ strike, which combined forces with the ongoing strike from the writers’ union, were felt immediately. Deadpool 3, Mission Impossible 8 and other major movies shut down their respective productions, which are on hold indefinitely. Networks have pivoted to focus more on unscripted programs, like reality shows, as the work stoppages wear on.
Tangent
Gunn, who has acted in works such as Guardians of the Galaxy and Gilmore Girls, also voiced his concerns over pay disparities in the entertainment industry. Gunn specifically took aim at Disney CEO Bob Iger’s recent comments about writers and actors not being “realistic” with their strikes. Gunn told Iger to “take a look in the mirror” and ask himself if it is morally correct to make “400 times more” than his company’s lowest-paid worker. “If your response is that that’s just the way business is done now… well that sucks and that makes you a s— person if that’s your answer,” Gunn said.
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