By this point in awards season, top-billed creators and performers behind Oscar-nominated films have received more than their share of press and advertising coverage. Others involved in the lauded films, particularly those on support staff, tend to go less celebrated.
“Assistants Behind the Oscars,” a new featurette released by Young Entertainment Activists on Friday morning, spotlights one of these less-applauded groups. In the wake of #PayUpHollywood, a movement that began in October 2019 to improve pay and work conditions for Hollywood assistants, which YEA has supported, the video gathers assistants from Joker, Marriage Story, Ford v Ferrari, The Irishman and Little Women to discuss their roles on the nominated films.
“I’m the liaison between my boss, between the studio, between the managers, between the agents, between the talent, between the crew,” Rachel Byrd, a producer’s assistant on Just Mercy, says in the video during a segment on assistants’ responsibilities on nominated films. As for Steven Martinez, a marketing and distribution assistant on Joker, he was “coordinating all our schedules for all the high-level strategy meetings, all our planning meetings, media, you name it, all of it goes through me.”
Several of the assistants spoke to why their projects meant so much to them. “It was always a dream to be on a movie like Joker,” LeMicah Levert, an editorial and VFX assistant on the film, says. “I literally walk around with a graphic novel called Absolute Joker and Absolute Lex Luthor [Absolute Luthor/Joker] in the back of my car. Like, it just stays in the back of my car.” Byrd adds, “I want to be a part of more stories that are about people’s humanity and about us connecting to one another.”
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Luke Pastor, an office production assistant on Little Women, expresses how he hopes the assistants’ words will resonate with viewers: “I hope that you enjoy the people and you stick around for the credits. Dozens and dozens and dozens of people come together to do the impossible, to make a movie. Everyone has to be on the same page, under a common vision, and as assistants, we’re really integral to that process.”
YEA released the video hours after it premiered at an “assistants only” screening of Kitty Green’s film The Assistant at the ArcLight Hollywood. Following the video and the feature, which depicts a day in the life of an assistant to a Harvey Weinstein-like entertainment mogul, the audience broke out into a meditation and town hall discussion about workplace harassment, gender disparities and Hollywood’s “pay your dues” culture.
Allison Begalman, YEA’s executive director, says in a call after the screening that The Assistant was “triggering” to many of the assistants present due to an industry culture and “abuse of power dynamics” it depicts. Several attendees left the screening crying. During the discussion section, the deliberate lack of people of color in the film, office allies, gender pronouns and mental health were discussed. The point of the event was to “empower” the assistant group, Begalman says: “We do have access to huge power from the desks that we’re at,” she says. “Being able to empower this community of young people…that’s the way we can change the industry.”
The group has additionally shot assistants on Oscar-nominated films for portraits, which are available to view on YEA’s Instagram page. See some of the portraits and the video below.
