Billy Porter Forced To Sell House Due To SAG-AFTRA & WGA Strikes

Billy Porter is just one of the many actors who are being personally affected by the ongoing SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes. The actor shared that he has been forced to sell his house due to the pause on projects he was supposed to be working on. 

“I have to sell my house… Because we’re on strike,” he told the London Evening Standard in an interview.  “And I don’t know when we’re gonna go back [to work]. The life of an artist, until you make f—you money — which I haven’t made yet — is still check-to-check. I was supposed to be in a new movie and on a new television show starting in September. None of that is happening.”

He commented on the exec who stated that they were planning on starving the actors and writers out. “You’ve already starved me out,” he said. 

Porter’s remarks were made just less than 100 days after the Writers Guild’s strike against streamers and studios. The actors have been on strike for about 25 days now. Both unions could not agree to a fair deal, leading them to go on strike until companies start agreeing to more fair contracts. 

Porter denied that the strike is about “a bunch of millionaires trying to get more millions,” but explained that most of the actors require financial security and are a part of the working class. 

“Now that streaming has become available, companies have not been agreeing to fair wages. There’s no contract for [streaming]… And they don’t have to be transparent with the numbers — it’s not Nielsen ratings anymore,” Porter stated. “The streaming companies are notoriously opaque with their viewership figures. The business has evolved. So the contract has to evolve and change, period.”

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He also slammed Disney CEO Bob Iger, who called both of the union’s demands unrealistic and that they have been “disruptive” to the industry.

“To hear Bob Iger say that our demands for a living wage are unrealistic? While he makes $78,000 a day? I don’t have any words for it, but: f— you. That’s not useful, so I’ve kept my mouth shut. I haven’t engaged because I’m so enraged… When I go back [to the U.S. from London] I will join the picket lines.”

One of Porter’s most recent films was Our Son, which premiered at the Tribeca Film Festival, where he acted with Luke Evans. His next film is set to be a biopic on James Baldwin, in which he will star in and is the co-writer.