Voice actors working in the video game space are going to be getting more money as the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists have both revised their contracts with game developers.

SAG actors will see an immediate 3 percent raise for in-game work, which will put those actors earnings in line with AFTRA. That increase will be followed by a 2.5 percent bump for both organizations on April 1, 2010. Both SAG and AFTRA are expected to ratify the new contracts in the coming weeks.

Among the issues addressed in the new agreement are standards surrounding “vocally stressful” voice work done in games and the creation of a new “atmospheric” category – allowing a single actor to voice several minor roles.

Other agreements include:

• A 0.5 percent increase in the pension and health contribution rate for Screen Actors Guild member effective upon ratification, and another 0.2 percent on January 1, 2010, for both unions (bringing the total rate to 15 percent).
• The establishment of a $100 liquidated damage for failure to give notice of vocally stressful work.
• An agreement to develop during the term of the contract a set of guidelines for conducting vocally stressful work.

It's looking unlikely, since AFTRA, one of the two major unions that represents TV and movie actors, has agreed to extend its contract with videogame publishers by one year, to the end of 2009, with just a modest 3% raise in minimum fees and .5% increase in health and pension benefits, as my colleage Dave McNary reports in tomorrow's Daily Variety.

However, as Hollywood watchers know, the other actors union, the Screen Actors Guild, tends to be more militant than AFTRA. Three years ago, it was SAG that led a charge to almost strike against the videogame industry (details here). SAG's current contract, which has the exact same terms as AFTRA's, also expires at the end of this year.

SAG's national director Doug Allen would only tell Daily Variety that the union will launch talks "in the near future."

One of the big problems for the unions when it comes to videogames is that they only cover a small portion of all the voiceover work done in the business, about 10-15% according to Dave. On the other hand, they cover some of the biggest franchises, like "Madden NFL" and "Halo." And a lot of videogame publishers still like getting movie and TV stars to do voices, particularly for licenses. If you want an actor with TV and/or movie credits working on your videogame, you probably need to do it under a SAG or AFTRA contract.

Full story: AFTRA extends gaming contract

There's a very interesting ad in Daily Variety and the Hollywood Reporter today from the Screen Actors Guild thanking the "innovative creators" of recent videogames that use SAG talent -- and more importantly to SAG, utilize its contract.

I can't help but assume that the ad is a reaction to last week's New York Times story noting that the voice talent in "Grand Theft Auto 4" are getting no residuals from that game's mega-success, since the current SAG contract doesn't include them. As I noted in a blog post about that story, the Times got a key fact wrong: videogame residuals are not an issue in the current SAG negotiations with the studios. But they will be an issue at the end of this year, when SAG's videogame contract expires.

It's also interesting to me what exact games SAG listed in the ad. I'm currently checking to see whether this is a sample of recent games they've covered, or all the ones in the past few years, but it's odd that seven of the nine -- all of them except "GTA 4" and "Assassin's Creed" -- are Activision games. Is Activision the only publisher that's using the SAG contract on a regular basis? Is it just a coincidence? It's definitely not a good sign for SAG if there aren't any games from Electronic Arts or THQ or Microsoft or Sony, for example, that it can cite as using its current contract.

Regardless, SAG's desire to spend money on this ad reinforces my belief that it's taking videogames pretty seriously and that we can expect a serious fight, and possible strike, when its current contract with publishers ends in December.

There's an interesting profile in the New York Times today of Michael Hollick, the actor who voices Niko Bellic in "Grand Theft Auto IV." As writer Seth Schiesel points out, Hollick got about $100,000 for his 15 months of work (on-and-off, I presume). That's not bad, but not in the ballpark of what the stars of other media that gross $500 million plus can expect. Not even those who do voiceover work, like the stars of big animated movies (Cameron Diaz, Eddie Murphy and Mike Myers famously get $10 million-plus for the "Shrek" films).

And as Schiesel points out, there are "zero royalties or residuals in sight." That's not true for actors in any other big media (that I'm aware of).

However, there's some context that Schiesel gets wrong. Here's what he writes about the role the Screen Actors Guild plays in this issue:

As it stands, [the actors in "GTA IV"] get nothing beyond the standard Screen Actor Guild  day rate they were originally paid. That is because the contracts between the actors’ union and the entertainment industry make little or no provision for electronic media like video games and the Internet. It is a discrepancy that is expected to dominate negotiations between Hollywood and the guild this summer, with many predicting an actors’ strike to parallel the writers’ strike last year, which revolved around similar issues.

Actually, there is a "provision" for videogames. It just doesn't include residuals. SAG almost went on strike trying to get residuals for top selling videogames in 2005. They even staged a protest at E3 that year. I know this because it was one of the early stories I covered for Variety. SAG ultimately failed, winning, as Claude Brodesser and I wrote in June of 2005, "zilch" in the form of residuals. All it managed to get was a 36% increase in the base day rate.

Schiesel is also wrong to say that videogames are an issue in the current SAG negotiations. The Internet is, but videogames aren't. Current talks and the potential strike this summer are with the major film and TV studios. SAG's residual-free contract with the big videogame publishers goes through the end of this year.

At that point, we may very well see a renewed push for residuals for stars like Hollick and even a potential strike. When the current contract was agreed to in 2005, then SAG president Melissa Gilbert said, "We will spend the next three-and-a-half years devoting resources to further organize this industry, and return to the bargaining table with renewed strength and vigor to establish a fair participation in the enormous profits generated by videogames."

The current SAG leadership, headed by Alan Rosenberg, came to power promising to be even more aggressive than Gilbert was on all fronts. So it's hard to imagine they don't have the same goal in mind.

(picture of Hollick taken from NYTimes.com)