Labor Litigation Landslide Hits L.A. Entertainment Companies
By ANDREW SIMONS
Staff Reporter
Television and movie producers have found themselves defending a spate of litigation resulting from an amendment to the state’s employment code that enables employees to seek damages for workplace violations.
In the five months since the new law went into effect, nearly half of the 50 cases filed in Alameda, Los Angeles, Orange and San Diego Superior Courts were brought against entertainment companies, and 17 were filed by present or former police officers moonlighting as security personnel, according to data assembled by the California Chamber of Commerce.
The chamber, which opposed passage of the amendment and is now seeking its appeal, could not say how many actions were brought in the same period last year.)
“Because of the nature of their business, entertainment firms face some compliance challenges in that they do a lot of work, with a number of people at remote locations,” said Allen Graves, partner at Pasadena law firm Graves & Associates representing some of the plaintiffs.
“While I think all industries are subject to litigation, the entertainment industry is more vulnerable than other businesses because of their high profile,” he said.
“Generally speaking, like any large employer, they’re going to get a lot of attention.”
The Labor Code Private Attorneys General Act of 2004, as the law is known, expands the claims employees can bring against their bosses for a variety of workplace violations. The change, which became effective on January 1, enables employees to seek damages for the violations.
Officials at studios named in the suits, including Warner Bros., Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Inc. and Touchstone Television, either declined to comment or did not return calls.
Melissa Patak, vice president of California government affairs for the Motion Picture Association of America, the trade group representing the seven major motion picture studios, declined to comment on the issue other than to say the group was talking to its members to gauge the depth of the problem.
In a suit brought against Touchstone, one of the officers claimed to have worked 15 hours on a set, but was compensated at the standard hourly rate of $34.27. State law calls for pay rates to increase after eight hours of work to time-and-a-half for the next four hours and double time thereafter.
Some of the suits brought by security officers are seeking to be joined as a class action.
“Class actions are very expensive, and at the end of the day you cure nothing,” said Howard Fabrick, a partner representing employers as part of the entertainment labor practice at Akin Gump Strauss Hauer & Feld LLP. “The statute still says employees must be paid on time. That’s a lot different than a class action that says XYZ makes an automobile with a defective braking system.
Solving the problem
“The purpose of the class action is to force the correction of the braking system to save lives,” he said. “And as a result of the lawsuit, the braking system gets corrected. That solves the problem. That is the purpose of class action.”
Cases brought against entertainment firms range from wage-and-hour complaints by contract security personnel to alleged violations of labor code posting requirements.
In one case, Graves is representing an employee of Vivendi-Universal who is suing the entertainment giant for not posting California’s employment code in the food kiosk where she works.
“Their first violation was that they failed to give employees a copy of the labor code,” said Graves.
“They then violated several statutes that would have been glaringly obvious if the posters had been up. They also failed to renew the workers’ comp poster when it was changed last year.”
Attorneys for Vivendi didn’t return calls for comment on the case.
If any of the cases are successful, the state may be the biggest beneficiary.
The law requires half of the award go to the state’s general fund, 25 percent to Labor and Workforce Development Agency and the balance to the plaintiff.
