Sean Cooley, executive director of the Producers’ Health Benefits Plan (PHBP), has unveiled a relief package voted on by the PHBP Board of Trustees to assist its AICP-member participating employers and covered staff and freelance employees as the Coronavirus/COVID-19 pandemic results in canceled and postponed commercial shoots, slowing workflow and loss of employment that is impacting the commercial production and postproduction industries. These measures will ensure that covered freelance employees are not at risk of losing their health benefits during this crisis; allows employers the option to temporarily insure laid off employees; and offers discounted premiums to those who may lose employer-paid coverage. PHBP covers approximately 4,000 workers and their families, with over 200 participating employers.
“PHBP’s primary reason for being is the health and welfare of the commercial industry’s freelancers and staff, and the production and post companies that employ them,” said Cooley. “We’ve taken measures today to ensure our freelance population does not lose coverage due to the sudden halt of production, as well as offering financial relief by temporarily waiving all monthly fees such as dependent coverage costs.”
The PHBP is unique in the entertainment sphere in that it offers employers a path to insuring both their staff and freelance employees under one umbrella.
“As our member employers grapple with the financial effects of the current crisis, the PHBP is allowing full time coverage for staff that might be shifted to part time, and the ability to keep laid off employees on the employer’s medical plan,” continued Cooley. “While layoffs by member employers have yet to materialize on a large scale, the Board wants to be proactive so production and post companies can better assess all options regarding the continued coverage of their staff employees.”
The Plan is also discounting monthly COBRA premiums, the self-paid continuation coverage offered to employees no longer covered on an employer’s Plan. “Whether you’re a recently laid off staff employee or a freelancer working hard to requalify for freelance coverage, this is huge,” said Cooley.
Among the highlights of the relief package (all effective immediately) are:
- Eligibility for Freelancers: All qualification periods will be extended three (3) months. This effectively extends coverage for three months for all currently covered Freelancers to prevent a lapse in coverage. Additionally, all recurring monthly fees will be waived for this period, including premium co-shares for dependent coverage.
- Furloughed or Laid off Staff Employees at PHBP-participating companies: PHBP will allow any furloughed or laid off covered staff employee to remain on their employer’s staff coverage (so long as the employer continues premium payments) through May 31, 2020.
- Reduced Hours of Full-time Staff Employees: PHBP will allow any currently covered full-time employee whose hours are reduced to part-time status with the same employer to remain on their employer’s staff coverage for April, May and June 2020; this temporarily waives the Plan rule that only full-time employees are eligible for staff coverage.
- COBRA Continuation Coverage: PHBP will apply a 20% discount on the medical only portion of COBRA costs. This discount applies to the cost of COBRA coverage in April, May and June 2020, and includes all staff employees who may be laid off as well as those staff and freelance employees already on COBRA coverage.
“PHBP and its Board of Trustees–which is comprised of participating production company representatives and freelance employees–will continue to monitor the situation and adjust our course of action as required for prudent governance and the well-being of our membership,” concluded Cooley.
Review: Writer-Director Coralie Fargeat’s “The Substance”
In its first two hours, "The Substance" is a well-made, entertaining movie. Writer-director Coralie Fargeat treats audiences to a heavy dose of biting social commentary on ageism and sexism in Hollywood, with a spoonful of sugar- and sparkle-doused body horror.
But the film's deliciously unhinged, blood-soaked and inevitably polarizing third act is what makes it unforgettable.
What begins as a dread-inducing but still relatively palatable sci-fi flick spirals deeper into absurdism and violence, eventually erupting — quite literally — into a full-blown monster movie. Let the viewer decide who the monster is.
Fargeat — who won best screenplay at this year's Cannes Film Festival — has been vocal about her reverence for "The Fly" director David Cronenberg, and fans of the godfather of body horror will see his unmistakable influence. But "The Substance" is also wholly unique and benefits from Fargeat's perspective, which, according to the French filmmaker, has involved extensive grappling with her own relationship to her body and society's scrutiny.
"The Substance" tells the story of Elisabeth Sparkle, a famed aerobics instructor with a televised show, played by a powerfully vulnerable Demi Moore. Sparkle is fired on her 50th birthday by a ruthless executive — a perfectly cast Dennis Quaid, who nails sleazy and gross.
Feeling rejected by a town that once loved her and despairing over her bygone star power, Sparkle learns from a handsome young nurse about a black-market drug that promises to create a "younger, more beautiful, more perfect" version of its user. Though she initially tosses the phone number in the trash, she soon fishes it out in a desperate panic and places an order.
The one rule to follow is that... Read More