The Cannes film festival is facing strike action as it opens next week and could see protests by projectionists, floor managers and press agents who are demanding changes to the French government’s treatment of seasonal film festival staff, reports The Guardian.
The festival on France’s Côte d’Azur has faced major strike action only once before, during the student protests and workers’ strikes that began in May 1968.
This year a collective called Sous les Écrans la Dèche (The Poverty Behind the Screens), which represents more than 200 workers, has called a strike over the government’s treatment of freelance workers at festivals across France. They include projectionists, programmers, box office staff, logistics managers, floor managers, drivers, decorators and press officers.
The collective said the government’s latest proposed changes to unemployment laws would make it impossible for many skilled film festival workers to get by. The workers are hired on short-term, seasonal contracts at film festivals across France. But they do not fall under France’s special unemployment insurance scheme for freelance performers, artists and technicians in the cultural sector. That scheme tops up salaries to a minimum wage, giving state support during periods of no work.
The collective said changes to the French unemployment system to be introduced at the start of July would leave seasonal film festival workers in an even harder position, with a higher threshold for claiming unemployment benefits.