Union Strategy in the Battle for Independents : Non-Union Productions Are Targeted, Especially if Studio Involvement Is Suspected. But Organizing Can Be Difficult

As a representative for the union of the least-famous workers in Hollywood--the crew members--Dale Paule did a lot of traveling.

From early 1989 until his retirement last fall, Paule pursued productions such as “RoboCop 2” to South Texas, “The Brotherhood” to Biloxi, Miss., and “Young Guns II” to the New Mexico desert.

The idea was a radical one in the anti-union ‘80s, but Paule’s International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE) was suffering, and producers were taking their films away from California’s labor laws and expensive union contracts with increasing frequency.

Armed with threats of tough tactics and a flexibility in wages, Paule signed up 69 films in 18 months, pictures on which production was initially begun without union involvement. Paule’s successor, Lyle Trachtenberg, was responsible for winning a contract last fall on ABC’s “Twin Peaks.”

The move to chase after non-union productions reflects a get-tough stance by the forces representing Hollywood’s stage and craft workers, and drivers who are represented by the Teamsters. The tactic is in response to a growing number of productions that sought to avoid unions, other than the actors, writers and directors guilds that are represented on virtually every production.

“A few years ago, it was nearly unheard of that I would pursue them out of California,” Paule said. “But now that philosophy has changed. If a motion picture emanates from Hollywood, no matter where it goes, I have jurisdiction. The unions have taken a beating over the past few years, and this is one of the ways that we can curtail the erosion of unions.”

Legally, no company is bound to use a union crew unless it has a contract with that union. The major studios all have contracts with the Teamsters and IATSE, as well as the Screen Actors Guild, the Directors Guild and the Writers Guild.

But in today’s Hollywood, many of the films that are released by major studios are produced by independent production companies--firms that have no union contracts to bind them.

It is these independent production companies, for the most part, that are avoiding union contracts, often even taking their productions underground in order to do so.

Whether an independent producer under contract to the studio uses a union is “none of our business,” said Robert Johnson, vice president of labor relations for the Walt Disney Co. “On certain occasions, a producer (has asked) what’s entailed in doing it union. In those cases, I generally suggest that the producer talk to the unions involved.”

As far as the unions are concerned, such a production typically falls into one of four categories:

* Legitimately independent films with a budget that is too small--$1 million or less--to afford a union crew. These films are generally left alone.

* Projects with large budgets but with no backing or involvement from a major studio.

* Legitimately independent films with financial backing from a major studio.

* Films whose producers claim they are independent, but which are really studio projects in disguise. Studio executives interviewed for this article deny that such arrangements exist, despite insistence by the unions that they do. “We do not do that,” said Warner Bros. spokesman Rob Friedman. “We do not do that at all.”

The latter two distinctions matter in the sense that if a union can prove that a film is actually being produced by a studio with which it has a contract, it can sue. It can also simply demand representation, rather than go through the time-consuming process of negotiating a new contract.

A more likely scenario, however, is that a film with a large enough budget to interest the unions does have some backing from a major studio, or at least a distribution deal, but the producers and the studio are careful enough to make sure the film is truly independent as defined by the contracts.

Generally in such cases, the studios bankroll the projects and then agree to distribute them when they are finished. These films are called “negative pickups” in industry jargon, because the studio pays for them and agrees to pick them up for distribution before they are completed.

Under the unions’ contracts, negative pickups are allowed, on the condition that the studio financing the picture limit its interest to the funding, and stay away from creative decisions or input.

Cannon, for example, says that “Tipperary,” a Drew Barrymore-Kris Kristofferson-Charlton Heston film that was interrupted by the Teamsters and their whistles in July, was a negative pickup. (The Teamsters won a contract on “Tipperary” an hour after disrupting the set and making it impossible to film.)

Edmund Hamburger, senior vice president and general counsel, said that Cannon, which is now owned by Pathe Entertainment, had agreed to finance and distribute the film, but that producer Alan Amiel was working completely independently to make it. A week after the incident with the Teamsters, Hamburger said in an interview that he didn’t even know that the shoot had been disrupted.

“He is an independent producer,” Hamburger said. “If he signed an agreement with the Teamsters, I don’t know what it has to do with Cannon. It’s an independent film. Amiel has no position or employment with Cannon.”

The Teamsters disagree. They have in their possession a list of Cannon projects, printed on company stationery, that includes “Tipperary” and states that filming was to begin last May 14. They also have an unsigned document that they claim is the original version of a contract between Cannon and Drew Barrymore. The document is accompanied by a letter from Cannon Vice Chairman William Immerman to the Inter Talent Agency, which describes the document as a “draft of a Deal Player Borrowing Agreement between Drewid Entertainment Co. for services of Drew Barrymore and Cannon Pictures Inc.”

The document, which was viewed by a reporter and a photocopy of which was obtained by The Times, was written on what appears to be Cannon stationery and detailed an agreement between Drewid Entertainment Company, Barrymore’s company, and Cannon Pictures Inc., for the services of Drew Barrymore. Cannon is listed as producer in the document, and Amiel and his Dunaira Holdings are not mentioned at all.

Hamburger would not confirm the veracity of the document, which appears to provide for payment to Barrymore in the amount of $225,000, plus expenses for out-of-town shoots in the amount of $2,000 per week for both the under-age actress and her guardian. An additional $28,500 per week was to be paid if production ran over schedule.

The Teamsters could not sue Cannon in this case, because the company does not have a standing contract with them, Connolly said, but it could target Cannon and its parent company, Pathe Entertainment, for other organizing attempts, instead of relegating its efforts to the independent production company.

Last year, the Teamsters filed a claim against producer Frank Mancuso Jr., saying that his film, “Internal Affairs,” was really made for Paramount. (The producer is the son of studio chairman Frank Mancuso.) But the Motion Picture Pension, Health and Welfare Fund, which heard the complaint, ruled in favor of Mancuso Jr.

“They were alleging that this was a studio movie, that we were using (the production company) Out of Town Films as a shell for Paramount,” Mancuso said. “We said all along that the financier in this case was Paramount, but . . . (Paramount) was not directly involved with the day-to-day aspects of producing the film.”

In fact, lawsuits against studios for negative pickups are rare, because it is extremely difficult to prove that a studio had creative input, such as a decision on hiring a major star. So in most cases, the union proceeds as if the film were truly independent.

But organizing independent projects can be very difficult. Unlike major studios, which have formed an easily identifiable alliance to negotiate union contracts, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, independents are small, difficult to find and often short-lived.

Often, a new production company will be formed just to make a single film. In terms of union organizing, that means new contracts must be negotiated each time.

Then there is the matter of finding out about the production, and convincing the producer to use union below-the-liners.

Union workers are more expensive, and many producers accuse the Teamsters in particular of “featherbedding,” or forcing management to add unnecessary positions just so that union members can have jobs.

“We can get people to do those jobs for nothing,” said one producer, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “Why should we bring in the union?”