Oliver Stone talks SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes, doesn’t see a quick fix – DEADLINE

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Oliver Stone said on Friday he was shocked to hear Christopher Nolan stars Oppenheimer He had pulled out of the London premiere the day before as SAG-AFTRA officially declared a strike.

“I know a lot of producers open movies, like Oppenheimer. Chuck Roven, he was in London. “I heard it was going to be called off,” Stone said when asked what he thought of the raid.

“I don’t know if it went ahead but all the actors left. It was shocking because they really meant to work and immediately stopped all promotions, which is a big deal.”

Commenting on the WGA’s ongoing 11-week strike, Stone suggested that the roots of the current industry strike lie in the deal reached to end the five-month writers’ strike in 1988.

“There was a fundamental miscarriage of justice when Brian Walton was president of the WGA, when we gave up. I wasn’t on the front line, but I supported that strike,” Stone said.

“We gave in to the producers. They got away with killing one such deal where all the DVD money was backdated. They claimed they were in the hole, in the red, and that they had to get their DVD money back.”

“I forget the percentage, but they took something like the first 75% off on top. The DVD business was huge, especially for my movies. So, the total wasn’t divided fairly.”

Stone said that trend continued with surplus and dividends.

“There’s not as much hangover, really, like earnings. Hangovers are important to some writers who don’t make as much money. But the people who make the money, they don’t touch the profits of the movie, like the studio does.”

“The studio always tells you they’re losing money, but they always find a way to make a new level of profit for 10 or 15 years… It’s the perpetual industry problem with a capitalist group that pays its executives more and more money and screws the average writer.”

Looking back at past industry events, Stone recalled how the 2007 writers’ strike initially led to the drama of the 1968 My Lai massacre being shelved. PinkvilleThen it was permanently canceled.

“We had three weeks to go and it was cancelled. He said.

Stone said he doubts there will be a quick or easy resolution to the current writer-actor disputes.

“I don’t think it’s going to be finished quickly. Because well, I don’t understand the economics of Netflix and these new guys, but it’s the same old bullshit. You know they make money and they always say they lose money. It’s the classic 1880s conflict in America” .

Stone was speaking to Deadline at the Jerusalem Film Festival where he premiered his 2022 documentary nuclear nowAnd Argumenting the issue of nuclear power as the only viable way to tackle climate change.

Based on the book A bright future: how some countries have solved climate change and the rest can followThe work premiered in Venice last year.

The work is a passion project for Stone, who says he was inspired to make the film by his fear of climate change.

I am not an expert in science and have nothing to do with nuclear energy. On the contrary, you could say I was a moderate believer in Jane Fonda and Ralph Nader’s conception in the 1980s that nuclear power was dangerous,” said the director, who also has co-writing credits with American scientist Joshua Goldstein.

“But it’s clear to me from my travels all over the world, it’s getting hotter, hotter, hotter. We were in Italy, two, three days ago, and they said it was the hottest day ever or something.”

Stone was also honored with the Jerusalem Film Festival’s Lifetime Achievement Award at the opening ceremony Thursday night, alongside Helen Mirren and Belgian director duo Luc and Jean-Pierre Dardenne.

The last time the director was in the country was in 2002 at the height of the second intifada to make his documentary. Unwanted personwhere he interviewed Israeli leaders Benjamin Netanyahu, Shimon Peres, Ehud Barak, Ariel Sharon, and the Palestinian Al-Aqsa Brigades about the conflict in the Middle East.

Two decades later, he suggested, the situation has not changed.

“It’s a repeating cycle. I’ve been here many times. I planted an olive tree for peace here in the 1990s with my then partner Arnon Milchan and came back in 2002 for Unwanted person…I don’t see a difference. It’s just worse. Like it’s getting hotter. He is choking more and more.