Angry workers threaten to grab spotlight at Cannes

The message on the answering machine goes like this: “We call on all of you to occupy the Cannes Film Festival from May 11 to May 23.” If that were a rallying cry to the Quentin Tarantino or “Shrek” fan clubs, it would seem harmless enough. Instead, the message emanates from the Paris headquarters of the Coordination des Intermittents, an organization established to defend the rights of part-time show business artists and technicians who are up in arms about revisions in their benefits system that tighten eligibility rules.

Although new Culture Minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres tried to calm workers after a strategically timed ministerial meeting Wednesday, just one week before the festival opens, a riled member of the workers’ group went on French radio to set a meeting in Paris for a “Call to Cannes” the same night. Donnedieu de Vabres proposed a reexamination of the system, along with funds to help those smarting from the recent changes, but workers were not satisfied.

Following the minister’s proposals Wednesday, workers occupied the newsroom at Canal Plus, France’s leading pay-TV service, for most of Thursday. A statement from the group’s headquarters read, “One week away from the Cannes festival, far from easing our minds, the discourse of the culture minister has added fuel to the fire.”

Demonstrators carried banners that read “La Palme dort” or “The Palme is asleep,” a reference to the Palme d’Or prize at Cannes.

The CGT, France’s most powerful union, said Thursday that “Cannes cannot go on as usual,” although it added that directors, films, technicians and actors would be respected.

Despite prolonged protests against revisions approved by the government last summer, the modifications were put into rolling effect in January, inflaming the workers known collectively as intermittents. In the process, cultural events all over France have been disrupted with increasing stealth.

As the attention of the global film business shifts to the French Riviera, protesters see a tantalizing opportunity to grab the spotlight at the Cannes Film Festival.

Cannes is a special case, as it employs its 1,500 workers on short-term contracts and not as intermittents. Many of the accredited festival attendees, however, do fall into the category, which means that some of them will have access to the Palais des Festivals, where all the main news conferences and screenings are held, as well as having a general presence in Cannes throughout the two-week event.

The heart of the dispute? Under the new rules, France’s part-time showbiz workers must clock a minimum of 507 hours -- for technicians, over a 10-month period, and for artists, over a 10 1/2-month period -- to qualify for benefits eight months out of a year. Under the previous system, the 507 hours could be spread over 12 months, and it entitled workers to 12 months of indemnities. To maintain benefits, the qualifying hours also must be worked each year.

Resolving the issue has proved to be so complicated that France’s previous culture minister, Jean-Jacques Aillagon, was recently replaced. Although many unions signed the proposals put forth by Aillagon and various government agencies last summer, the CGT, which represents a variety of workers, refused to go along.

For actors and technicians, the problem is acute: With about 130,000 registered intermittents -- a figure that has doubled in the last 10 years -- if there isn’t enough work to go around, how can they keep themselves going? Beyond the problem of underemployment, many criticize a system that has led to abuse by production companies whereby anyone from a secretary to a script reader is classified as an intermittent to offset the costs of hiring workers as employees, which in France entails hefty social charges levied on the hiring company.

Although Cannes offers a high-profile platform for the protesters, festival organizers maintain that measures in place will make it nearly impossible for angry workers to impede activities via staged walkouts or projectionists who cease work mid-screening.

“Because of the ongoing terrorist threats, the entire country is already at the highest level of alert, so security is at a maximum,” says Veronique Cayla, the festival’s managing director. “But in the dialogue that we have started with the workers, we find that our objectives are complementary, and so there should be no reason for major interference.” Cayla added that special venues would be set up for workers to air their grievances in the hopes that that would diffuse any tension that might result in clandestine job actions.

While the CGT is one of the main unions representing the temporary workers, it is also one of the founders of the Cannes festival and therefore feels that anything that would hinder the festival would be counterproductive. “We are worried that there could be total disorder,” said Laurent Blois, general delegate for the technicians’ and directors’ branch of the CGT.

Given the tenacity the disgruntled workers have shown, it would not be surprising if they were to stage protests during the festival or create disruptions like those that have plagued French cultural events for the last year.

Perhaps the most egregious case was last summer’s Avignon Festival. The largest theater event in France, it attracts 100,000 visitors each year and is vital to the local economy. Walkouts by technicians and actors on the first two nights prompted festival organizers to close down the event.

In December, demonstrators sneaked into a private party preceding the French premiere of “The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King” at the National Library in Paris, effectively shutting it down, but not before they gulped champagne and canapes. At the time, French distributor Metropolitan Films threatened to sue the library.

France’s leading television network, TF1, was hit when protesters stormed the set of a live reality show and the show’s presenter suffered a broken arm. Three arrests were made, and TF1 said it would press charges.

Last summer, protests at the nascent Paris Cinema festival forced cancellation of round-table gatherings, and some directors pulled their work in solidarity with the workers.

In January, protests were staged outside the Theatre du Chatelet on the night of the Cesar Awards (France’s version of the Oscars) while inside, actress-writer-director Agnes Jaoui lambasted then-Culture Minister Aillagon from the stage.

Most recently, the ceremony for France’s Tony equivalent, the Molieres, was disrupted when technicians ceased work during the event, leaving the Theatre des Champs-Elysees in darkness and without sound, but the show did go on.

Despite assurances from Cannes officials, some directors and producers with films at the festival remain nervous. Laure Duthilleul, whose “Nelly” has a berth in the “Un Certain Regard” sidebar, says that, although she has benefited from the system herself, “it would be idiotic to tamper with Cannes. I’d be angry.”