Nya Patrinos, a set decorator for shows like “Pam and Tommy” and “The Morning Show,” studied architecture before pursuing a career in set design. “When I started there were four Black decorators,” Patrinos said in TheWrap’s Bold Steps presented by Johnnie Walker. “And then there were three for a while. Now 24 years later, there’s four. I mean, there’s no progress. So we’re working on all kinds of problems.”

Patrinos said 2023 was one of the worst years she’s had financially due to the strikes. “I have to remind myself that it wasn’t personal, that I hadn’t done anything wrong, because sometimes I became depressed,” she said. “But the strikes became an opportunity for me to volunteer more in the local and then I also went back to school full time.”

She continued, saying the changed industry makes it hard for workers in Hollywood to make a livable wage.

“When I started, I could be on a TV show and it would be 20 to 24 episodes. Now I gotta interview for a job every three months,” she said. “It’s a lot of variables to make a life so when the writers were talking about it I thought, ‘Yeah, everything you’re talking about, I have the same problems and I make less money than you.”

The post Set Decorator Nya Patrinos Says Issues Resolved During Writers’ and Actors’ Strikes ‘Are Our Issues Too’ appeared first on TheWrap.

“I kind of fell into it as I was trying to make my way as an actor. Having a little bit of an acting background helps me as a dolly grip because part of your job is to be able to follow the movements of the actors,” he said in TheWrap’s Bold Steps presented by Johnnie Walker.

Buehler’s last job of 2023 was working on the second season of “American Auto,” then the work dried up due to the strikes.

“2020 was rough, but this year was harder,” he said candidly. “My wife just gave birth to our second daughter in April, and then the strike happened right at the beginning of May. There were a couple of months there without anything, which was nice in part just because I got a chance to bond with this baby more than the first one.”

The grueling job of a crew member meant that when his first daughter was born, Buehler was away most of the day.

“When my first daughter was born, I’d leave home before she was awake and I’d get home from work after she was already in bed. But you know, we needed our health care. We needed to take care of ourselves.”

Now, Buelher is excited to get back to work and looks to the most experienced crew members to help hone his craft.

“I’m going to be doing this for another 30 years probably” he continued. “And I want to try to set the stage for what those 30 years look like to better myself, to better my career. And I’m excited to kind of be back at that, making some movie magic.”

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“I started out wanting to be a writer,” Ballerini told TheWrap as part of the video series Bold Steps, presented by Johnnie Walker. “Then as I started watching plays, and I started watching films, I realized I wanted to be a part of this world where I could work with directors, I could work with screenwriters, I could work with costume designers, I could work with makeup artists.”

Ballerini, whose onscreen credits include “The Sopranos” and “Boardwalk Empire,” said he immediately sparked to the collaborative nature of filmmaking. But that collaboration was put to the test when the actors of SAG-AFTRA went on strike last year.

“The strike was painful,” he said, adding that the strike coincided with the release of “A Murder at the End of the World,” which meant he couldn’t promote it due to SAG’s rules of the strike. “I had a show that was coming out and of course, we weren’t allowed to promote it, which was frustrating, there was no doubt about it. It was frustrating to have to stay silent and say like, ‘Look, I have this great role in this great series, but I can’t tell you about it.’”

The work that Ballerini does in the audio space was not struck so he could continue making a living, and he was delighted to find that other actors looking for non-struck work during the strike reached out to him.

“A lot of people would write me or call me and say, ‘I need to get into this world too. I have bills to pay. Can you help me?,’” he explained. “One of the most satisfying moments of the strike for me was an actor friend of mine who said, ‘I just booked an audio book!’”

That collaboration that’s so key to making great art extended to the picket lines, and Ballerini said it was heartening to see so many extending a helping hand.

“That’s the great part of the solidarity among actors, like how can we help each other? But it was a painful time there’s no question about it,” he continued.

The strike ended just before “A Murder at the End of the World” premiered, allowing for a last-minute event to celebrate the release of one of Ballerini’s most high-profile roles to date.

“The strike ended the day before our premiere event, and so everybody sort of scrambled and came together and it was this moment where we all got to see each other again,” he said. “There were a lot of hugs, a lot of laughter, a lot of smiles. And it made me realize it is that collaborative nature of this industry that makes it special. It’s the people coming together to do something. So to have that moment, we got very lucky.”

The post From Audiobooks to ‘A Murder at the End of the World’, Actor Edoardo Ballerini Says Collaboration Is Key appeared first on TheWrap.

“I’ve always loved TV,” Nabers said in TheWrap’s Bold Steps presented by Johnnie Walker. “But there weren’t a lot of TV shows that represented us. So to be able to do it now as an adult is a lifelong dream of mine.”

The original series “Swarm,” which Nabers cocreated with Donald Glover, tells the story of Dre (Dominique Fishback), a young woman who has an eerie obsession with a pop star. The unsettling series defies categorization, which is a testament to the gutsy storytelling decisions made by Nabers on the show.

But while Nabers was happy to get “Swarm” off the ground, it’s far from her first rodeo, and her time in the TV industry fueled her passion when the writers’ guild went on strike last summer.

“The strike was hard,” she acknowledged. “I did not write a single thing during the strike. I was very adamant about going out [and] marching. I read other people’s work, I talked to a lot of people, I took people to dinner, I took people to coffee, but it got worrisome. Five months is a really long time.”

Nabers had a baby and a new house, which added to the stress, but at the end of the day, she said the strike was hard-won.

“The writers’ strike was about transparency,” she said. “A lot of people were being very selfish and a lot of people were taking advantage of writers’ times.”

Nabers spoke to the issue of “mini-rooms,” a recent practice in which studios would assemble small groups of writers to work with a showrunner to hash out a show’s season or storylines without promising employment once the show got picked up.

“We would write outlines, we would help with dialogue,” she continued. “Sometimes you would write episodes and then your contract would be done, and then you would leave and then you would be like two or three years into these mini-rooms and not having anything to show for it. No actual episode on TV.”

The writer and producer said the issue is an existential one.

“If you want to establish a new generation of storytelling, if you really want to change the business, you have to start from the beginning,” she continued. “You have to give those people the agency to fight for their episodes, to understand their episodes and to champion those episodes.”

As part of the WGA’s new deal with studios, mini-rooms were effectively ended. Nabers called the win “historic” and said she’s grateful that the writing community “stuck to our guns.”

“I’m really grateful to be back to work. I’m really grateful to advocate for other voices and writers coming up, and I just want to make cool stuff and keep on truckin’,” she said.

The post ‘Swarm’ Cocreator Janine Nabers Says Giving Writers Agency Is Crucial to Establishing ‘A New Generation of Storytelling’ appeared first on TheWrap.