SAG-AFTRA has reached a deal. What happens now?

After 118 days, the Hollywood actors' union says their strike is over. Vulture critic Kathryn VanArendonk joins guest host Amil Niazi from Los Angeles to walk us through the drama that unfolded before the tentative agreement was reached.

We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow the Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud podcast, on your favourite podcast player.

LISTEN | Today's episode on YouTube:

Amil: Kathryn, we normally reach you at home in New Jersey. But today, oh my gosh, we're so lucky. You are right in the heart of it, in Los Angeles. What's the mood like there right now?

Kathryn: I think everyone is relieved, and exhausted, and a little exasperated that it has taken this long to get to this place. But I think everyone is just incredibly anxious to get back to doing their jobs, to being able to promote the work that they have done.

I think part of what feels so notable about this is after the writers' strike ended, there was a lot of talk about, like, "Alright, actors. It's going to take a week, and we're going to be back to work maybe even by Halloween. Everything's going to be all sorted." And there was instead this real insistence that no, this is a moment that we need to take and actually iron out every single thing we possibly can in this contract. And so instead, it has taken several more weeks than I think some people were expecting. And now there is just this immense relief that finally a deal has been reached.

Amil: I can only imagine. On that stickiness, the fact that it took this extra time, there was a lot of talk about last, best, final offers, about what they actually needed to get this over the line. Can you walk us through some of what those points were, and what they couldn't agree on until just yesterday?

Kathryn: Yes. So as with the writers' strike, there was word over the weekend that the studios had presented what they were insisting was their last, best and final — which is a phrase that I love very much because "last" and "final" mean the same thing; you don't need both of those words. But they're clearly trying some kind of tactic that says, "We're not going to change anything about this." And then wouldn't you know it, SAG-AFTRA released a statement that said, "Actually, this has a truly nightmarish AI deal and we will not be signing it."

And so instead, there was still another round of back-and-forth before they were able to reach an agreement. The AI deal that had been in that last and final offer … allowed studios to use scans of people without their consent. It allowed studios to use scans of deceased celebrities without asking for the consent of their estates. And so, you get a lot of incredulous and truly upset responses to that. They went back a couple more times, and it does seem like they have reached an AI agreement that includes consent and compensation. As is the case with most of this deal, though, we don't really have the specific details of what that is, and so people are watching very closely to see what this will actually look like over the next couple days.

Amil: Another big sticking point was streaming residuals. We know that actors do not get paid the same when their show is running on Netflix sort of in perpetuity. I know we don't know the details of the contract, but what are you hearing about where they're at when it comes to streaming residuals?

Kathryn: What we have so far is basically this statement that SAG released. They say that it is a billion dollar deal, it has the biggest increase in minimum wages and, like the writers' contract, it has a new language for how to create residuals for streaming programs. We do not have the details about what that's going to look like yet. In the writers' strike, the writers' new contract involves giving residuals for shows that are only performing above a certain percentage threshold for each streaming platform. We don't have a sense yet whether the SAG residuals will look like that or whether there's a different model.

The other thing to remember is that for SAG and for the WGA, the goal was not necessarily to get the best possible numbers that they could. The goal was to create any kind of structure so that they can negotiate in the future on a structure that already exists, rather than the situation where they have been…. It's so much easier to say, "Bump that number up a percentage," than to create that permission in the first place. So that really feels like the major win here.

Amil: Is this something SAG is celebrating? Are they coming out of here drinking champagne and popping bottles, or are they just satisfied that people can finally get back to work?

Kathryn: There is champagne bottle-popping for sure. I think everyone is so happy that this was not a rubber-stamp deal. I think everyone is doing a little backwards looking at the DGA, which made a very fast deal even though it looked like everyone else was going to really hold out for a new paradigm of what these contracts can look like. But it really remains to be seen. It was a unanimous vote in favor of this deal as far as the SAG negotiating committee, but it does remain to be seen once the more specific details of what the deal looks like comes out, how the membership at large responds.

Amil: OK, Kathryn, final question to you: what changes [are in store] for the average viewer now that the strike is over?

Kathryn: Well, hopefully it's going to be that everything starts to get back into production pretty soon. But really, the end of the strike means that we slowly start to get back to something like where we were — except, studios have been kind of holding onto projects so that there's never been this huge gulf of content. What we will instead feel is a slowing down of the big projects because there is this backlog of work that has not been done. [Law & Order: Special Victims Unit] is probably going to have a 13-episode season, as opposed to the standard 22, but 13 is better than nothing. And, thank God, you're going to be able to see all the celebrities out talking about their projects again. We all love that ridiculous press tour stuff. It's one of my favorite shows, and it's coming back.

Amil: I mean, that's why we're all here, right? Kathryn, thank you so much for taking time to chat with us while you're in L.A.

Kathryn: Thanks for having me.

You can listen to the full discussion from today's show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.

Interview with Kathryn VanArendonk produced by John Perry.