Success Stories

A POTENT REMINDER OF WHY WE ARE LUCKY TO BE TEAMSTERS...
One of the Major Studios was refusing to pay some of our members their benefits....the Union filed grievances against the Studio on behalf of those members....and still...nothing....then Leo gave Steve permission to tell the studio that if we did not get those people taken care of...ALL the LA Teamsters were going to stage a Job Action....we got an immediate response....and these people will be paid. This is a potent reminder of the fact that had we settled for Non-affiliate status (as we were pressured to do by management)....who would be standing behind those colleagues now?????

FROM: Mary Gail Artz and Steven Jacobs

We were hired to cast 5 roles on an independent film, with a budget less than $1,000,000 that is about to shoot in Arizona. The production wanted to pay us as independent contractors, but we refused. By sticking to our guns we now have 10 weeks of Union wages accruing.

FROM: Matthew Barry and Nancy Keyes:

For "Good Luck Chuck" an 18 million dollar film with Dane Cook and 
Jessica Alba, Lions Gate said they would not sign a contract with the 
teamsters. When we threatened not to do the film, they quickly changed their 
minds.

We began working.

3 weeks and still no paychecks. We spoke with Business Affairs and they 
said "Due to the new rules, the Payroll Company (in this case Entertainment 
Partners) had to set up a casting corporation in order to pay us"

6 weeks and we still had not been paid.

"Hello Teamsters? Steve Dayan, please"

Not only did all 6 paychecks arrive 90 minutes later, Steve had a 
Teamster agreement signed with Lions Gate for ALL future casting directors 
within the hour.

I've heard other casting directors having the same problems getting 
"started" and everyone is still in the "learning process".

But its nice to know we finally have the power behind us.

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