The Business of Broadway - August 2021
August 2021
Chapter 15 - Actors
Actors’ Equity announced sweeping changes to its membership program that will allow any professional actor or stage manager to join the union. The change, announced Wednesday, will allow actors or stage managers who can demonstrate having been paid for those roles in the U.S. to join the union for an eligibility term of two years. ... Actors’ Equity said it was waiving prior restrictions on membership in its quest to become a more equitable organization.
“The old system had a significant flaw: It made employers the gatekeepers of Equity membership, with almost no other pathways to joining,” Kate Shindle, president of Actors’ Equity Association, said in a press release. “The entertainment industry is disproportionately white, including and especially theatrical leadership. The union has inadvertently contributed to the systemic exclusion of BIPOC artists and others with marginalized identities by maintaining a system in which being hired to work those contracts was a prerequisite of membership. We hope that artists from all backgrounds will join us in building a union that uplifts the entire theatre community, especially those who have not felt included or welcome in the past.”
Equity will also allow former members to rejoin the union without the need to secure a new contract and has removed restrictions on membership for international stage managers and actors. This also allows Equity Membership Candidate members, who had been working to complete 25 weeks of work at eligible theaters to join the Actors’ Equity, to join the union. ... As with other theatrical unions, the health fund covering Actors’ Equity members has suffered from the lack of employer contributions during the pandemic. In response, trustees made changes to the plan, which now requires members to work more weeks to earn coverage in six-month increments.
Chapter 11 – Unique Financials (Post-Pandemic New Normal)
When the Broadway production of Antoinette Nwandu’s play “Pass Over” opens on Broadway, it’ll incorporate significant changes — both on stage and behind the scenes.
The backstage innovations, meanwhile, encompass compensation for actors that’s well above the Equity minimum, plus a weekly mental health stipend. According to playwright-producer Nwandu, the creators and producers of “Pass Over” instituted those structural changes in the hopes of inspiring others to shift the model, too.
“This small cast let me at least begin to create precedent-level changes,” Nwandu said. “So if you are going to produce a show on Broadway and be a part of it in the coming days — let me show you that there is a way to get it done where we treat people like human beings all the time.”
She added, “The change that we’re talking about in our show, the healing that we’re talking about in the play, also has to happen in rehearsal when we’re making the play. I can’t treat you like sh– and say, ‘Ooh, the play is about healing!'”
Meanwhile, producers are working to pull in audiences outside of the traditional (i.e. older and white) Broadway demographic by locking in accessible ticket pricing options and forging partnerships with organizations like churches and BIPOC-led community groups. Nwandu outlined just how different the play’s new finale will be from the prior versions. Hint: The character who died in those productions will live in the new rewrite.
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