Tom Cruise spoke against AI and advocated for stunt workers during a SAG-AFTRA negotiating session with film and TV studios in June before the strike.
Before actors and performers hit the picket lines on Friday, Tom Cruise joined a SAG-AFTRA negotiating session last month to support the union’s proposals for more protections against artificial intelligence and better pay and safeguards for stunt workers.
Cruise appeared at the June meeting through a Zoom call after the guild decided his expertise would aid their talks with film and television studios for a new contract, The Times has confirmed. No other actors of Cruise’s stature had joined negotiations in such a capacity, according to the Hollywood Reporter, which was first to report Cruise’s Zoom lobbying.
But even the star power of the “Mission: Impossible” actor, who famously does his own stunts, couldn’t get the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers to budge on their bids. After about five weeks of negotiating, talks with the studios fell apart as the guild’s contract expired last week, leading SAG-AFTRA to call on its members to strike.
On Tuesday, Day 3 of the strike, SAG-AFTRA released its contract proposals, along with what the union said were the studios’ responses. The guild accused the studios of “repeated stonewalling and delays,” adding that “they intentionally dragged their feet.”
Within its proposals, the union had requested general wage increases as well as a plan for actors to get a share of the revenue from streaming hits. Also within its proposals were issues Cruise lobbied for, such as protections for “human-created work,” which would require consent and compensation from an actor before AI is used in replicating a performer’s voice or likeness, or when a “digital replica” is created.
