Directors Guild of America ratifies new contract boosting streaming residuals

Members of the Directors Guild of America have voted to ratify a new contract that the union says will provide a significant boost in residual payments from streaming video services as well as an increase in wages.

The three-year agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers was approved last month by the guild’s national board, which voted unanimously in favor of the deal. The membership vote began Jan. 4, with the results finalized Wednesday night.

Under the new contract, directors will see an increase in residuals from shows that meet a certain production cost threshold on streaming services such as Amazon Prime, Netflix and Hulu. The guild hasn’t released details of the new structure, but said the deal more than triples residuals for members working on original content for the biggest streaming companies. For example, a member who received $15,000 over three years for the reuse of original shows on sites like Netflix will get $50,000 under the new contract.

The negotiations, which began Dec. 5, were in response to the growing dominance of Netflix, Amazon Prime, Hulu and other streaming services in the entertainment space.

The DGA said wages will also receive a boost, with an increase of 2.5% in the first year of the agreement and 3% in the second and third years. The deal also will increase employer contributions to the guild’s pension plan.

The guild said the new contract’s three-year term will take effect July 1 and run through June 30, 2020.

“Our major gains in streaming video-on-demand residuals, together with our improvements in wages and pensions, were the result of our forward-thinking preparation,” DGA President Paris Barclay said in a statement.

The guild said that the new contract was ratified by an “overwhelming margin” but didn’t provide voting results.

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