Actor Billy Porter is putting his house on the market—and he’s not happy about it.
The Emmy award-winning actor has been forced to sell his home due to financial hardship brought on by the ongoing strike involving members of SAG-AFTRA and the Writers Guild of America.
“I have to sell my house,” Porter told “the Evening Standard.” “Because we’re on strike. 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.”
On July 14, 2023, actors belonging to SAG-AFTA joined members of the Writers Guild in a strike against major studios represented by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers. Actors and writers demands include fair pay
and protection against emerging technologies like artificial intelligence.Last month, Disney CEO Bob Iger made headlines with his remarks on the strike when he said the demands from actors and writers are “just not realistic” and the strike is “adding to a set of challenges that this business is already facing that is quite frankly very disruptive and dangerous.”
“To hear Bob Iger say that our demands for a living wage are unrealistic? While he makes $78,000 a day?” Porter said.
“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…But when I go back [to the U.S.] I will join the picket lines.”
The Pose star also responded to an anonymous executive who reportedly said execs were looking to “allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses.”
“So to the person who said, ‘We’re going to starve them out until they have to sell their apartments,’ you’ve already starved me out,” Porter said.
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