Six months after COVID-19 hit, very few things were occurring in the film industry. But things began to pick up once vaccines were released. Filming resumed, and everyone thought it was going to be okay. “It started slowly, but surely people were making things, but it really wasn’t until this spring when the vaccines came out that things started to really start booming again,”George Sledge says, who has worked as both a producer and director for thirty years. Still, there are lots of work“Filmmakers in COVID times. tend to obstacles that are involved when “It’s the COVID-19 be adaptable people who Return producing a film in COVID-19 To Work Agreement with all the times. It’s crucial that everyone are always looking for a main filmmaking unions which is is vaccinated and getting tested way to adapt to adverse the DGA, which is directors. The every day. The entire staff has to circumstances,” Bujalski says. Oxy is the technical union. SAGwear masks and face shields. Even with all these precautions, the biggest challenge posed by COVID is keeping everyone, but especially the actors, safe. “Filmmakers tend “The challenge is that to be adaptable there’s a little bit of a gap, whereas someone might get people who are it before it shows up? There’s always looking always a margin of error,” for a way to Sledge says, “The testing every day, it’s going to sometimes adapt to adverse pinpoint someone who’s circumstances,” managed to get it because you can’t control a person’s life. All you can do is ask people to try to remain in the bubble as much as possible, but then take a lot AFTRA is the actor’s union.” of precautions in case something Sledge says, “The Teamsters are slips through,”. the drivers. All of these people There is also something got together and they created else going on in the studio while this outline which was how producing a film. Because of to move forward in the era of COVID-19, many filmmaking Covid.” unions got together to create an Members of the Screen outline for how the film industry Actors Guild, or SAG, will was going to move forward and
sometimes be on sets where films are being shot and watch like a hawk to make sure that everyone is following the rules and being safe from COVID-19, when actors who are part of the organization are working on the film. “And when, when we use an actor in the SAG” Sledge says, “ we have to abide by those rules. They’re watching us there and they will enforce the rules.” Another big problem that the film industry is facing nowadays is having to manage everyone; actors, producers, staff, etc.. And it’s not just inside the studio that gets you, it’s also outside. People are always making sure that the rules are being followed. Andrew Bujalski, one independent filmmaker, has realized these problems. “Because when you make a movie the old fashioned way, it’s a lot of people in a lot of enclosed spaces,” Bujalski says. “Breathing each other’s air and that became very dangerous
Lights Out! - Lights! Camera! Covid? - pg 12
