SAG-AFTRA Implements New Self-Taping Audition Guidelines For Low-Budget Projects
deadline.comSAG-AFTRA has implemented new protections for the self-taping of auditions for low-budget productions. The move was made, the guild said, “to address members’ concerns about this common yet frequently challenging practice.” The new guidelines limit all low-budget projects to the reading of five script pages for a first self-taped audition, although additional pages can be requested for a callback or on zoom.
A newly seated Self-Tape Committee will coordinate the ongoing work of various union committees around self-taping “with an eye toward added safety enhancements for other entertainment contracts,” the guild said.
SAG-AFTRA’s National Board green-lit the new low-budget self-taping guidelines, which had been approved at the guild’s 2021 convention and reviewed by its internal committees. “These improvements come in the wake of a union-distributed member survey to assess the state of self-taping in the industry,” the guild said in a statement. “The results of that survey and extended research done after the conclusion of the original study were considered by leadership and shared with members in several online streaming productions.” The 9,300 members who responded to the survey (about 5% of the guild’s members), said that 92% of the roles they auditioned for required them to self-record and upload their auditions; that 15% of the roles they were up for required them to audition virtually through Zoom or some other live platform, and that less than 4% of prospective jobs required them to audition in person.
According to the survey, 91% of respondents said they had to provide their own recording equipment for self-taped auditions; 82% said they’d been asked to audition on a weekend; 60% said they had been asked to
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