Equity in the News Deadline

Labor leaders from five unions including Actors’ Equity Association today joined together to demand Senate action on the HEROES Act, calling the additional $600 in weekly pandemic unemployment benefits essential for food and shelter.

There’s no cheek-to-cheek dance or whispering of sweet nothings between Belle and the Beast in a new show attraction that’s the latest Walt Disney World production revamped for a park without actors.

Actors’ Equity Association is calling the pending expiration of federal pandemic unemployment benefits “inexcusable” and says Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell “dithers” as theater workers “stare down an uncertain future.”

Up characters Russell and Dug the dog are out — and so are the Actors’ Equity members who played them — in a revamped version of a bird-show attraction at Walt Disney World’s Animal Kingdom.

Actors’ Equity Association says Walt Disney World has “locked out” its union members as a way of retaliating against Equity’s demand for coronavirus testing as a condition for returning to work, while Disney says park safety protocols have been accepted by other unions.

Actors’ Equity has approved the first two theaters to resume performances since the nationwide shuttering of playhouses in March due to the coronavirus pandemic. The theaters, a pair of regional venues in Massachusetts, have agreed to safety protocols that include testing for Equity members and those who come in contact with them.

Just days after Actors’ Equity Association urged members not to take jobs with Florida’s Walt Disney World until the resort agrees to provide COVID-19 testing, the amusement park reports that “tens of thousands of cast members” are preparing to return for the phased opening that begins July 11.

The executive committee of Actors’ Equity Association unanimously has rejected Walt Disney World’s reopening safety plan for workers because the proposal does not include coronavirus testing for the park’s performers.

With thousands of out-of-work theater professionals likely to become ineligible for their union insurance over the next six months as the COVID-19 pandemic shutdown continues, The Actors Fund is launching a campaign to enhance its health insurance counseling and enrollment support services.

Actors’ Equity Association is calling on Walt Disney World in Florida to follow California’s Disneyland in postponing its reopening due to the ongoing coronavirus pandemic, and to strengthen safety protocols with regular testing, the union said today.