Toronto film workers claim they haven't been paid by Gerard Butler's production company
Toronto crew members on an upcoming film produced by Gerard Butler's G-BASE production company are claiming that, after consistently being paid late, they're still owed pay for the last week of filming more than a week after the production wrapped.
Toronto is a de facto Hollywood satellite, serving as a filming location for major productions and local indie flicks alike, but, as some members of the city's film industry are revealing, Toronto's proximity to Tinseltown isn't all as glittery as it's cracked up to be.
Instagram account @crewstoriesig, which shares everything from local production updates to clips and memories from beloved Toronto productions, took to the platform earlier this week to share one worker's alleged experience working on an upcoming film adaptation of Stephen Belber's off-Broadway play, "Don't Go Gentle."
The post features a series of screenshots documenting the crew's alleged experience with Gerard Butler's G-BASE production company, which is helming the project.
The first slide of the post includes a message, seemingly sent from a member of the production crew to the Instagram account, which claims that, over five weeks of production, only the first two weeks were paid on time.
"Then it was a week and a half late. Then 5 days late and now it's been over a week and there's been zero communication. So a total of the last three weeks of shooting were/are late. No suppliers or rental houses were paid, the craft/catering team wasn't paid either," the post reads.
The caption of the post provides even more context.
"Once we wrapped the last week the producers ran away back to LA and didn't pay us for the last 7 days of filming, any additional wrap days and none of the suppliers have been paid. They are not responding to emails," the caption reads.
The post further includes email correspondence from the production company to the crew, which explains that the company was waiting for Entertainment Partners (EP), the production's payroll and finance management provider, to release funds so cheques could be printed and sent to the crew.
The email goes on to promise that payments should be received by Oct. 23; however, now a week later, the crew claims the payments still haven't been received.
"We are working diligently to resolve this matter as quickly as possible, and we retain the leverage necessary to facilitate the release of outstanding payments," another email from the production reads. "We will provide an update as soon as a payment date is confirmed."
On the bright side, at least they hosted a wrap party.
blogTO was unable to contact G-BASE for comment on this issue.
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