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President's Report
Last year I wrote about the exciting challenges the Guild faces as we enter the 21st century, and our efforts to give DGA economic and creative rights protection to those working in the independent film community. I am very happy to report that we are still moving forward at full speed to strengthen our Guild with new faces and fresh ideas.
During this past year we have seen our Independent Directors Committee grow through active participation of new members Miguel Arteta, Christopher Coppola, Tamra Davis, Spike Jonze, Doug Liman and Alexander Payne. We have continued the Director's Finder series showcasing unreleased independent films made under a DGA agreement. I'm happy to report that this series has helped some of these DGA indie director films to find distribution.
This year also saw us create new internet agreements which extended Guild protection to members who venture into this new frontier. Like our Low Budget Agreements
for indie directors, these internet agreements are remarkably flexible. Our staff, under the leadership of our National
Executive Director Jay D. Roth, wisely recognized that this Web industry was still in its infancy, nobody can predict what the internet will eventually become, so the Guild's approach to agreements should be flexibility and user-friendliness. One need only look at the turmoil in this business during the past year to recognize the soundness of our approach. As the internet develops into a substantial medium for the circulation
of entertainment, we will be watching and examining
the business carefully to make sure our members are protected creatively and financially.
In addition, we achieved dramatic gains for those
members who bring their talents to commercials. I am particularly proud that for the first time we achieved recognition for commercial directors in the area of creative rights, which may presage a new era for directors in this medium.
We also negotiated a five-year agreement increasing our share of levies from foreign countries which compensate U.S. rights-holders for the private copying and rental of their work.
In the summer, we held an intensive Creative Rights Teach-in for directors working in long-form and episodic television. The well-attended event accentuated the value of a renewed commitment by our members to standing up for their creative rights.
And, of course, I am very pleased with the success of our second DGA Honors which showcases the many talents who make the East Coast entertainment community vibrant. I want to thank our National Vice President Ed Sherin, who was the visionary force behind the creation of this event, as well as all of the people who contributed and made this evening memorable.
I cannot report satisfactory progress in every area of
concern to the Guild. I am terribly disturbed, truly appalled by the dismal statistics with regard to the industry's hiring of our women and minority members. [See DGA Annual Report on Women and Minority Hiring] The Directors Guild does not control the
hiring of directors. We have met repeatedly with industry executives to seek their attention to the problem of under-employment of women and minorities. Each time we received promises that they would do everything
they could to provide more opportunities. The results prove that that is not enough. We will continue to address this
issue vigorously until the promises they made turn into promises kept.
The gains we have made, and many others, have only been possible through the Guild's unified membership supported by the best professional staff of any labor organization in our industry. We must not, however, become complacent in our strength.
The year ahead figures to be tempestuous. With the storm warnings of a potential 2001 strike by SAG and the WGA which might conceivably shut down the motion picture and television industry, we are certain to be buffeted by hostile winds. There are serious residuals issues which will present a test of the ability of the industry's negotiators and all of us have a stake in the outcome. At the same time, the WGA has unwisely placed an attack on directors' rights on their negotiating agenda. Their challenge to the way motion pictures are made forces us to monitor closely the course of their negotiations and do whatever is necessary to ensure that the industry avoids a shipwreck on this issue.
Whatever the challenges, Directors Guild members have good reason for optimism. This is in perfect keeping with
the spirit of those original 13 independently minded directors who founded this remarkable institution back in 1936. Those individuals saw the wisdom of standing together whenever their work or their livelihoods were challenged. Their unity began the long process of fighting for the protections and
benefits that we all enjoy today. That strength and spirit lives on in the Guild today, and I have no doubt it will see us through the next year and toward the next set of challenges and triumphs.
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