Visual effects may not be the first artform that springs to mind when you think Saturday Night Live, but try picturing what your favorite SNL pre-tape might look like without a VFX team to bring it to life.
As TheWrap reports, SNL’s VFX team—comprised of 16 VFX artists and VFX leads—has voted unanimously to unionize with the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE).
“Over the six seasons I’ve worked at SNL, I’ve seen the VFX department evolve from a small group to a tightly integrated, highly organized operation capable of delivering hundreds of demanding shots over a 24-hour period,” said VFX artist Richard Lampasone in a statement. “It’s an intense, collaborative, and extremely fun environment that constantly tests the limits of our skills, our versatility, and, after long days staring at a screen, our ability to form coherent sentences.”
“Our work, like that of everyone else above and below the line, is critical to the show’s success,” Lampasone continued. “We look forward to celebrating Season 50 by joining in SNL’s decades-long tradition of supporting union labor, and to helping negotiate a contract that reflects the substantial value we add and makes ours a more accessible and sustainable career for years to come.”
TheWrap cites “My Best Friend’s House,” a pre-taped digital short that premiered during Ariana Grande’s latest appearance, as an example of the work that the VFX team does—working under enormous time constraints. A 2017 Fast Company article stated that the VFX team typically has just 12 hours to make their particular brand of magic happen.
SNL’s editing team faced a similar scenario in October 2022, when they began their own campaign to unionize. In March 2023, they signed their first labor organization contract—narrowly avoiding a strike.
“The editors had their union officially certified through the voluntary recognition process after an independent arbitrator confirmed support for the union through a card check,” the IATSE wrote in a press release. “This week, NBCUniversal management agreed to a similar process for recognizing SNL VFX Workers’ union after SNL VFX workers presented signed authorization cards demonstrating 100 percent support for unionization.”
“We deserve what every other department at SNL has,” said VFX lead David Torres Eber. “We deserve to be protected, we deserve to be represented, and we deserve to be on equal footing with the people we work directly side-by-side with. SNL is a very stressful show to work on, while also being a very enriching experience full of creative problems to solve. We should be focused on those problems each week and not whether our insurance has lapsed or when we can schedule a doctor’s appointment after the summer hiatus ends.”
