Who Needs Sleep? Haskell Wexler Reveals Dangerous Conditions in Film Industry in His Documentary

This is a hard one, the reality of shooting a film, especially scheduling makes it hard to really shorten days meaningfully without affecting quality, and like the article says, some people thrive on it, everyone has their own stories of pulling insane stretches for a project. I think some positions can be more physically exhausting than others so maybe there should be some sort of reworking of schedules to maintain safety but there won't be anything regulations can solve without tackling the economics of the industry. Also, from my (admiitidly) limited experience a lot of reality productions I have worked for that are run well avoid this kind of trap, but some of the bigger ones do still demand long hours, but there's no one answer to this. In any insanely competetive industry I'm sure long hours are the norm, it's probably just par for the course.

I adamantly disagree with this clearly one sided article. Saying that a job "prohibits film workers from spending time with their families (which is borderline inhumane in and of itself)" is absolutely ludicrous. What about the money they earn from the job that provides food, shelter, and education for their families? Is that inhumane? In this logic, every job is inhumane because it separates families. I've never heard such nonsense. This one sided argument is exactly why America has progressively become more and more dependent on Unions and government to take care, or regulate their lives.

Also, these "below-the-line crew" members you refer to often work their way up, and end up making a lot of money. The 14 hour work days often become 6 hour work days as you move up. Regulating business is nothing more than stripping individuals of the right to choose. It is a sacrifice of liberty for the potential of security.

it would be nice if they shortened it to maybe 12 hours. 14 is a little long and seems like it would mean less sleep which means less creativity. however, it takes a while for a crew to set up and an actor to really get going so id say that if you cut it too short it would result in the production taking way more time to complete.

I feel there should be a clear cut distinction between pulling long hours simply because of technical or logistical constraints, and working overtime simply because the people in charge are not doing their job efficiently. I never mind working long hours/overtime as I'm always grateful of landing a gig. I've had extremely enriching experiences working long hours on set while learning from the best. However, it is frustrating and quite aggravating when I must work 18+ hours/day because the director has no clue what (s)he is doing or is in the middle of a nervous/psychotic breakdown (saw that one happen twice), or when the AD is a pushover and has no clear concept of time, or when inept producers are unable to fully coordinate stuff prior call time.

Long hours are a necessity of the industry unfortunately. That doesn't make it right and no amount of money is worth the prolonged affect on ones health. It's not necessarily the hours that are harmful but the manner in which they screw with the body's internal clock. Say you start on a Monday with a 6am call-time, work a super long day then production is forced to push the call time for Tuesday in order to meet the 10-12hr. turnaround time. This happens every day of the week and so by the time you reach Friday your call time is as late as 4pm meaning you go home for the weekend on Saturday morning as the sun is coming up. You sleep Saturday, do laundry etc. then go to bed early on Sunday evening to do it all again Monday...

This is quite common on TV series. Imagine living like that for 6 months straight? It takes a toll on the body and mind. When you're starting out you soon get used to it but after doing it for years, especially once you have a family, it gets extremely tough.

I agree with the comment above about the film industry being similar to the military in its structure and organisation. Like the military there are many facets of the industry in terms of job standards (like sexism, bullying and even hazing rituals) that are still completely accepted as part of the industry. That said, a soldier is fighting for something, lives are on the line, in the film biz we're hardly saving lives...

The point is needs or exploitation. I did a shoot in difficult conditions and everybody put in more than the rack rate. And everybody was paid fairly. But if it turns into a situation where the grips have to pay for the happy table... forget it. It´s not just that the set will stink - the product will.

I remember when I was working being thrilled every time we passed an overtime mark, time and a half, double time and a half, triple time, etc. More money was awesome, but I was also in my twenties and my body could handle it. Today I'm not so sure I could, I'm not as energetic as I used to be, but on top of that I just have a lot more self-respect. I love making movies and I've definitely pulled my fair share of all nighters at locations that included three hours of commute, but if I had to do it on the regular I'd probably quit.

If there's a solution it would be to ramp up the overtime structure. Start time and a half at eight hours and increase it from there. Salaries are a big part of any production budget and once the bean counters start seeing those Benjamins add up they'll start to look at whether overtime is really necessary on any particular shooting day. Workers will get more money for less time making the whole family argument much less of an issue.

I know that in Europe shooting days tend to be much shorter than they are in America, and they still make great movies and TV.

"Creativity and ability to focus" can only be good for the show. If for no other reason, productions should let their people rest so that they can turn out a better product. Making crap faster is not a worthwhile goal, and ultimately *reduces* return-on-investment.

Thank you so much for posting this! I've been trying to find this doc everywhere without luck.

Long hours are NOT a necessity if you schedule more days. Of course you're going to run over every once in a while to make your day, but when you're working 15 hours consecutively during the week, that's uncalled for.

I worked on an indie B-movie that was trying to cram 9 pages of shooting into a day and we were constantly going over 14. Why not try to shoot a film in 20 days instead of 15? Even THAT is crazy. At least they were cool enough to give us a 12-hour turnaround even if we went over.

You old people who need your sleep should quit or retire and let people like myself take your positions. You young people who complain about lack of sleep shouldn't be in this business.

I left the VFX industry (post) because of the damage it caused to my relationships and mental health. Working 14hr days might be ok once in a while but not for extended periods when coupled with 6-7 day weeks. That's no way to live.
Almost all the time pressure comes from the studios who set unreasonable time frames and play one vendor off against the other. It comes down to money I.e. Profit. Films could get made based on 8hr days and 5 day weeks but it would take longer and therefore cost more. Which would actually give the director more opportunity to be across everything where generally they can't keep up.
I know work in TV in a job where I work 5 days a week and 8hrs a day.
Unfortunately I can't see the situation changing in film whilst Fox, Warner, Disney etc are in charge

Wexler, who's been a life-long supporter of the radical left, has made a number of pro-communist documentaries, including the ones on Castro's Cuba and Weather Underground. I personally find his political stance quite odious.
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PS. The problem with the long days is not the number of hours per se but the lack of preparation for them. If you know you're likely to have a super-long day, rent a camper or a hotel room nearby and avoid driving long distances to and fro. And, as the last resort, don't take the gig.
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PPS. It's a fairly well known fact that staff writers on a lot of sitcoms are often asked to work into the wee hours. If you have to finish the script for a next day shoot or rewrite pages that flopped in front of the live audience, you do what your show-runner tells you. I was told that one female creator/show-runner stayed up until 4 AM regularly. She was actually married, albeit without kids, but had her husband on the set and her staff writers had to keep the same hours. But the show was a huge hit and made careers of a lot of folks involved with it. And so they stayed, at least, for a year or two.

It's one thing to be above-the-line working 14-16hrs/day and another thing to be below-the-line working 14-16hrs/day because the financial incentives are different.

another point not considered here is that in addition to the 14/16 hr workday, there's your commute time to and from set which could be another 45min to an hour each way.

so, make that a 16 to 18hr workday, 6 days/week - and this doesn't include the time it takes for you to sh*t, shower, shave, eat and spend minimal time with family. on episodic and feature work i don't ever recall getting more than 5-6hrs sleep on work nights (even though you're still within your 8 hrs)

it's really hurtful when your significant other, kid(s), family and friends no longer include you in their plans and daily lives because you're working 80+ hrs/wk.

true, no one forces film crews to work these horrible hours, but then again there's reason wage earners should be forced to work excessive hours per day even with overtime. there always comes a point when the human body needs rest before it starts breaking down.

sure, making $4k+ a week is fine and dandy, but what good is it if you're not around to spend it?

12 hrs should be the absolute max. Period. 12 hr turn around for everyone. Period.
Haskel Wexler needs to replace Steven Poster.

The video games industry has been dealing with this problem for many years. Do a good search for the "EA Spouse" fiasco. I used to work in the video games industry, games on my credits include Counter Strike: Condition Zero, Star Wars: The Force Unleashed, and Tony Hawk: RIDE. Every company I worked for had "crunch time", where we'd work more than 12 hrs per day 6 or 7 days a week for weeks at a time. Sometimes I worked 24hrs straight. Without any overtime pay. Let me say that again... the video games industry does not have any standard to pay employees overtime pay, so none of us get any.

I left the games industry because despite people working hard to change those conditions, they were not changing enough. I know others who have left the industry because of the work conditions.

Mark Webb's comment above is a perfect example of someone having to leave the VFX industry to protect their health and relationships. http://nofilmschool.com/2014/01/haskell-wexler-reveals-dangerous-conditi...

At the end of the day, the debate isn't about whether a person can tolerate the work conditions. It's about whether the industry can tolerate having passionate, talented veterans quit their careers early because the industry became unsafe to their health and relationships.

It's about whether the industry is willing to lose that expertise and skill, and become a machine that chews up immature promising talent year after year, without ever really evolving because so much knowledge is lost when people die or leave to save themselves.

We have a rule in our company that no one spends more than 10 hours a day on production and caped at 5 days straight per week simply because more sleep equals better decisions the next morning. We don't pay over time because we don't allow anyone to work over time. It makes better productivity in the long term to allow crew and cast time to recuperate which in turn for us, produces better results. If we pushed our crews to shoot 16 hours per day 6 days a week for 18 weeks straight, our product would suffer, and so would our people. Our approach makes better economics.

While filmmakers do work very long hours, hours not considered 'normal' to the public, I think we have to bear in mind that there are other professions that work the same or more hours. I am not trying to 'normalize' the notion of a 14 hour workday buth something that should be taken into consideration in this debate is that most of those with careers in film are not working everyday of the year. In fact it is more like every 3rd or 4th day of the year, which means that the hours balance when compared to a 'normal' 9-5 job.

I think some professions like medicine, developers (especially those in startups), firefighters, paramedics, nurses and even some chefs have very long hours, (12-20 or more). From my experience with my family (who are all doctors) residents are 'limited' to 72 hour long shifts with no break. Considering the potential for danger in medicine and other emergency services, I think it is very important to acknowledge the incredible danger of sleep ER doctors diganosing patients. Although I do not want to belittle the film industry (especially since that would mean belittling myself), I would have liked to see the documentary focus more on these jobs, as well as in the film industry.

Just my (very long) 2 cents.

Many NFL coaches work 17 hour days. And that's for 7 to 8 months straight. There's a 4 month off-season. Some sleep at the office so to save time driving home to sleep. When they get up they can go right back to work. One coach named Joe Gibbs thought he should put some priority on his family. So he decided he would go home to sleep on 4 nights of the week and sleep 3 nights at the office. He thought giving one more day a week of sleep at home than to the office was giving something to his family. Things don't always work out neat and tidy like on old time, happy ending tv shows. If you can get a break to work in a good paying production count your blessings---or go into a different line of work.

the last production death march I did was 10 back to back 18hr days. never again. at one point on day 7 or 8 I simply couldn't stay awake during the afternoon. I setup an interview type shot, and let the director roll the camera. I went back to my room and crashed out for a couple hours. I know other crew people where stealing naps when they could. thankfully I wasn't driving on that job, we stayed on location.... which is part of what fed the long hours never being more than a 1/2hr away from base while shooting. thankfully we had an RV on that shoot too.

when long days come up now I say no. while I'll still do a single long day, it comes with a day off after it.

mostly what it comes down to is trying to do too much in one day. you can do things like pre-light locations and stage stuff so you can manage shorter days. that just requires good planning that seems to be lacking out there at some level. I'm finding now most clients don't want to do the long days either. they are done at 8hrs. my last several shoots have in fact run those hours and its far more civilized and your work is better,

as DP I can say I'm on set from start to end of day. cameras get built, you need to direct where lighting is going. nothing worse than running a couple hundred feet of cable to the wrong spots. fixing these mistakes saves time in the end. so most of the above the line people are there for hrs about as long as the rest.

A poorly run set that allows consistent 18 hours days for no reason other than poor planning should not be justified as "part of the industry". If there is an urgent need for it on occasion, its understandable, but people should learn how to work within their means. I'd rather have an alert, well-rested crew than an impaired one.

There's already such much stupid content being produced every moment that people should concentrate harder on the content they are producing and the means they have to produce it before subjecting a crew to work beyond exhaustion for your stupid production. I see it happen all the time where half-thought out ideas are streamlined straight into production without the necessary means nor inspired crew and the product suffers.

I've fallen asleep driving home after long shoots a couple times, both time I woke up just before disaster. I love what I do for a living but I would like to see some reasonable regulation set on turn over time. Working 18+ hour days is dangerous for everyone when I'm putting a 50lb or heavier light up 20 feet and my brain is mush.

I think only noobs and idiots do these insane hours and still paint it as something normal, even pretending it is something positive. A well known German grip once told me, when asked if he bid on a Bollywood movie that was shoot here (Don 2) - that he waved off because he won't take 12 hour days at 6 day weeks, it's just not worth it. And to show another perspective, I work on set and in post. The poor set people work insane hours for peanuts, in my opinion. I get three times than they get, plus overtime and can charge the company for the taxi back home when I leave the studio after 10 p.m. - people, you have to stand up, some fucks make up straw man arguments (comparison with war, calling things socialism or over regulation) in order to exploit you.

If someone wanted to make me work so long hours that it would be dangerous for me to go home, they'd better either provide a taxi service, or pay me for being away from home on top of my work hours...

Of course, i'm making my own movies, so i'm the one who decides the format of work. And as i'm very safety oriented, i would never let anything like that happen.

The more blood, sweat, and tears that go into any artwork the better. The end result is the only thing that matters. If the work is too taxing for you to justify then quit.

Back in the doldrums of the 2008-2009 economic downturn I did a lot of IT contracting work because it was the only work I could find, and it pays better than being a day laborer.
They have a very similar situation among entry-level, lower skill IT contracting. Stuff like Point of Sale installations, bank conversions (I worked on the Chase take over of Wamu) and server installs.
In many of these gigs we are expected to work until the job is done. This equates to 12 hour days as the baseline and 16 hours or more are not exceptional.
During the downturn the IT firms that do these projects saw an opportunity.
Same as with film and television production there is a limitless supply of eager young people ready and willing to work their behinds off in the belief that they will distinguish themselves.
Of course this means that anyone who fails to do whatever the project manager demands is cut right away and replaced.
This is a threat held over everyone's head, spoken or not.
I've worked on shifts that lasted for over 18 hours. Many times we simply took 1 or 2 hour naps to clear out the crazy from our heads then get back to work.
It is readily apparent to any IT veteran when a sleep deprived team has done an install. Wires are badly dressed. Steps are skipped. And it is not uncommon to see things installed upside down, backwards or just plain broken.
Working past 12 hours just plain yields poor results. It should not be the norm. Your brain is not as sharp, your judgement suffers and the quality drops.

More than once I have had to work for 24 or even 48 hours in a row. I am capable of doing such shifts. I'd even say that since I cut my teeth in production I am more accustomed to this kind of environment than most. The real shame is that as a "contractor" I got no benefits, no overtime, no taxes withheld and was not eligible for unemployment.

People in the upper echelons justify this abuse of production (and IT) staff saying that they worked some long hours coming up. Why should todays PAs be different? In fact they love to laugh it off and one up each other with stories of how long they worked under what conditions ( I do this myself).
The difference of course is one of degree. . What was once an exception, has since become the expectation.

PLEASE THERE IS NO DEBATE!. THIS SHOULD NOT BE AN ARGUMENT.

Everyone who thinks they have an argument supporting long hours are just beginners. And should grow up in the industry.

Its the responsibility of who writes this website not to instigate and promote amateur and unsupported arguments. Please, you are forming the opinion and the mindset of the next generation of filmmakers, do it responsibly.

I have worked at a successful, syndicated talk for show for 12 years. It's a union job. Thank god for pension and health care. However, I have worked MANY 30 hour work days. I had to stop working these hours when I had brain surgery for a non-malignant growth.
Management started getting concerned when there were so many car accidents with the long shifts...for a few minutes Now this is being encouraged. And this is a DGA shop

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You can provide food on the table and pay your bills for a twelve hour day. Do not be silly. When you mentality is in a unreasonable state of thinking , you make irresponsible decisions. You can not compare work schefule from 1979 to 2014 that just won't work. If any we have become fadter in technology in every aspect. So why don't we learn to work smarter than harder. The point is the individual is not at their best or 100 productive with a 14 plus days. If something does not feel right in terms of safety I will voice my opinion. This is not monkey see monkey do. SAFETY BEGINS WITH Clarity and getting reasonable amount of sleep. Its called common sense and reason which equals good judgement calls..

Working hours in Europe is longer than 14 h, when not filming with kids. Its quite exhausting. Sometimes fun. But doing it for 5 years, getting shit as payed and no overtime payment it tends to get pretty bad for you.

I love working on movies. But I can feel it tearing up my body and mind. Right now I am a directors assistant. Doing alot of shitty jobs for the director. I was a scenographer, trying to work with my own movies besides doing professional jobs. But to get to be a director professionally I had to climb the latter again. How many years should it take me?

I work as an assistant to a composer in LA and I've worked 7 days in a row 12-14 hour days (sometimes more) for months on end, for less than minimum wage, no benefits and no taxes taken out. It is near impossible for me to even afford to pay rent let alone have a life (I'm 26, I like to have a little fun).

Aside from never having any free time to actually compose music for indie projects or other things that come my way, all my peers walked around like zombies with all the creative vigor seemingly beaten out of them from years of slaving to further their bosses career.

I feel pretty burnt out already and don't know how much I'll be able to handle much longer but it's good to read other stories and to know that there are other people out there who give a shit about people's well beings in this industry.