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30 November 2007



Broadway Strike Ends in “A Good Compromise”

For three weeks, more than two dozen Broadway theatres in New York City were dark due to a strike by members of Local One of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees. After three days of marathon negotiations, they came to an agreement with the League of American Theaters and Producers. Details are slowly leaking out, but it looks like everyone gave a little and everyone got a little.

New York theatre in general has had very little labor trouble. The last strike to darken theatres was a four-day walkout by musicians in 2003. One has to go back almost two decades to find another such problem. This was the first strike ever in the history of the IATSE. Needless to say, in such a strike averse environment, the issues at hand had to be most divisive to cause a strike.

The four basic issues were the “load in” work rules, overtime, performance calls rules and wages. In exchange for what appears to be a raise bigger than the 3.5% the producers originally offered, the union agreed to loosen the working rules. For example, according to Wikipedia, the rules on load in (essentially moving a show into a theatre) “require producers to determine ahead of time how many stagehands are needed on each given day. These numbers cannot change once load-in begins, requiring producers to pay salaries even if no work occurs. The rule forces producers to better manage load-in and ensures that workers will not be on call (and unpaid for it) during the load-in period. The producers proposed essentially eliminating the rule. The union agreed to loosen the rule, but sought to keep a minimum number of stagehands at work each day.”

The strike was a boon to the Off-Broadway shows (defined as any theatre in Manhattan that has 100 to 499 seats) as well as those Broadway theatres not covered by Local One’s labor deal. The TKTS booth in Times Square, where patrons can get half-price tickets the day of the show, reported a doubling of sales. “Forbidden Broadway,” a long running satire that pokes fun of the latest hits, added two performances to its weekly schedule. Reuters reported, “New World Stage, which is a five-theatre complex just west of Times Square, has seen a marked increase in ticket sales. Since the strike began, many of the shows including ‘Altar Boyz’ and ‘Die Mommy Die’ have sold out.”

The thing isn’t over yet, though. The union still has to ratify the deal within the next 10 days. And New York 1, a cable news station, reported, “The producers of nine Broadway shows are suing the striking stagehands of Local One of the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees and their president James Claffey Jr. for $35 million, seeking to recover lost revenues.” That suit should get tossed quickly enough, but as any actor can attest, strange things happen in the theatre.

© Copyright 2007 by The Kensington Review, Jeff Myhre, PhD, Editor. No part of this publication may be reproduced without written consent. Produced using Fedora Linux.


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