Kevin O’Neil is still waiting, watching and working.
A little over two months into the Hollywood actors’ strike, the executive director of marketing and operations at Celtic Studios in Baton Rouge is carrying out the plan the studio formulated when the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists joined the Writers Guild of America in trading scripts for picket signs. The writers had ceased work on May 2.
Both the writers and actors are seeking better wages and compensation for streaming content, and protection from artificial intelligence (AI).
While film production has paused, Celtic is concentrating on event rentals and community outreach.
“We just had the Elon Cotillion fall dance event here on Saturday, which was great,” O’Neil said Tuesday. “They had a thousand kids here and wow.”
Kevin O’Neil
Up next is Rhea Lana’s children’s consignment sale in October, always a big hit but growing each year.
No, it’s not as sexy as shooting a Disney TV series or feature film, but its keeping Celtic’s doors open and small staff on the payroll, O’Neill said.
The studio’s also partnered with Fathers On a Mission, which will host a fall pumpkin patch and barbecue cook-off there soon. FOAM is a Baton Rouge area nonprofit focused on empowering men to become better father figures in the community.
Additional, Celtic’s relationship with Mt. Carmel Baptist Church in north Baton Rouge continues.
“They’re trying to target junior and seniors and train them, you know, for college internships and trades, which is where I came into the picture,” I can I tell them about the film trade.
“We did the (Men’s Ministry) Men of Honor at Mt. Carmel a couple weeks ago and Coach Mike Roach was there. His son is Malcolm Roach who plays for the Saints. We had about 50 junior and senior athletes from Madison Prep. … We broke up into six different focus groups and talked to them about soft skills — how to do interviews, college recruitment, etc. It was fabulous,” he said.
The church’s younger children toured the facility on Saturday to get introduced to the film trade. Celtic also is reaching out to area high schools to schedule visits for film trade presentations.
About those strikes
The most promising news out of Tinseltown last week was that striking WGA reps were returning to the bargaining table across from their Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers counterparts.
“So obviously we probably won’t hear much the rest of the week, depending on how it goes,” O’Neil said. “There’s always a media blackout (during negotiations). I think they’re hopeful. … After they come to a tentative agreement, then the Screen Actors Guild, I think, would be the next step.”
Meanwhile, 400-plus independent productions have received SAG waivers so they can start or resume their projects, with actors being an essential piece of the puzzle.
“But the thing is the big, major leagues (actors) aren’t gonna play right now because it’s kind of like scabbing when the NFL was on strike,” he said. “So, depending on what side you’re looking at it from kind of determines your take on it.”
The challenge for Hollywood, however, is that actors aren’t inclined to break picket lines. Cases in point: “The Drew Barrymore Show” and “Real Time with Bill Maher,” which both had announced plans to restart production, only to withdraw those plans after facing push back from her fellow SAG-AFTRA members.
“So, you know, it’s a very fine line you’re dealing with,” O’Neil said.
O’Neil still believes it’s a great time for independent non-union filmmakers, because at the moment “there’s no competition and everybody needs content.”
Time spent regrouping after COVID-19 lockdowns followed closely by a cloud of skepticism about the pending strikes indicates lack of content will impact the industry for not months, but rather a couple of years, O’Neil projected.
“So it’s gonna be fast and furious, and it’s probably going be three years of nonstop work for everybody,” O’Neill said in predicting the post-strike scenario.
Meanwhile, viewers can expect lots of reruns (like CBS picking up sister network Paramount’s “Yellowstone” for Sunday night airings), and more reality series.
Setting an example for pivoting during the Hollywood pause is streaming service Netflix, O’Neill said.
“We’re seeing that influx of movies and all this other content on Netflix because they need content. Netflix is really brilliant about how they do things. They’re training independent people, you know, anyone with a phone that can make a movie, on how to make content for them. They do these two- and three-week seminars.
O’Neill says “the sad fact” is that we’re not going to have new content until we start making more content.
Meanwhile, viewers can expect more reality series which don’t need writers and often use non-union production crews, daytime dramas (soap operas) and even foreign-made productions which don’t fall under SAG-AFTRA.