A check-in with SAG-AFTRA president Sean Astin
The Business
KCRW
4.5 • 699 Ratings
🗓️ 6 March 2026
⏱️ 29 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week, Kim talks with SAG-AFTRA president Sean Astin about stepping into the job during a tumultuous year for Hollywood. His early tenure has already included an FCC clash involving Jimmy Kimmel, the arrival of synthetic “performers,” and some wonky legal maneuvering from OpenAI. Astin discusses the most pressing issues facing the union as bargaining is underway, including wages and working conditions as well as the challenges posed by AI companies scraping copyrighted material.
Plus, David Ellison has unveiled plans to merge Paramount+ and HBO Max into a single streaming platform. Kim Masters and Matt Belloni dig into the proposal – which comes with about $80 billion in debt and the strong likelihood of layoffs – and the familiar promise that “synergies” in tech, ad sales and platforms will do the heavy lifting. They also examine how the shake-up may affect HBO leadership, the uncertain future of CNN, and how Donald Trump’s influence could complicate an already fraught moment for media companies.
Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | From KCRW, I'm Kim Masters, and this is the business. |
| 0:05.5 | Sean Aston became president of SAGAFTRA at a very fraught time in Hollywood. |
| 0:10.4 | Contract negotiations are underway, and he's already had to navigate through the FCC battle over Jimmy Kimmel, |
| 0:16.2 | the unveiling of synthetic actors, and that funky legal maneuvering from OpenAI. |
| 0:21.6 | The opt-out concept was absurd on the face of it, where, you know, if you happen to discover |
| 0:28.2 | that a character you've done is being used by Open AI, you can, like, call their 1-800 number |
| 0:33.2 | and see if they'll take it down. That was just ridiculous. Sean Astin joins us to discuss his first months |
| 0:38.7 | as SAG After President |
| 0:39.8 | and the most pressing issues |
| 0:41.3 | in the Guild's negotiation with the studios. |
| 0:43.9 | He also addresses the challenges of dealing with AI data scraping |
| 0:47.5 | and offers his take on the synthetic performer Tilly Norwood. |
| 0:52.2 | But first we banter. |
| 0:53.5 | Stick around. |
| 0:54.2 | It's the business from KCRW. |
| 0:58.0 | I am joined by my partner in banter, Matt Bellany. |
| 1:01.3 | Hi there. |
| 1:03.2 | So, David Ellison participated in a call with Wall Street people earlier this week. |
| 1:09.0 | He announced modestly that he is going to |
| 1:12.5 | reinvent the business. So that's, that seems very ambitious. This is a very horizontal merger, |
| 1:19.7 | right? We've talked about this. Everything, they've got two up, two streamers, two groups of table |
| 1:26.0 | channels, two movie studios. |
... |
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