The Hollywood star Bryan Cranston (67) also shows solidarity with his striking acting colleagues. As reported by the American “Variety”, among others, the “Breaking Bad” actor gave a flaming speech at a SAG-AFTRA rally in Times Square in New York City on Tuesday, which Disney boss Bob Iger (72) targeted. “We have a message for Mr. Iger,” Cranston said. “We ask you to listen to us: we won’t let robots take our work away from us!” Cranston cried emotionally to the crowd.
The actor alludes to the demand of the actors’ union that little or no artificial intelligence is used in films, for example to reduce the costs of extras and smaller roles. Rumor has it that extras are scanned once for a daily rate so that they can be used again and again in film productions in the future.
Cranston also demanded a general right to work for his guild and a decent living. At the end of his speech he remarked: “Finally and most importantly, we will not let you take away our dignity! We are a union through and through, to the end!”
In his speech, Cranston also emotionally addressed the content of the ongoing strike by filmmakers. He found that his industry had changed fundamentally. You are no longer in the business model of ten years ago. Cranston joins a ranks of film stars publicly supporting the strike. Previously, other famous actors such as Steve Buscemi, Christian Slater, Jessica Chastain and Brendan Fraser also appeared at the event.
The SAG-AFTRA union called the strike on July 13. Since then, the actors have joined the industrial action of the screenwriters, who have long since stopped work. The main protests are in Los Angeles and New York. Since then, numerous film and television projects have been put on hold. The strike is slowly spilling over to Europe as well, with the British union Equity, for example, already showing solidarity.
