In June, Hollywood issued new rules:
- All employees are required to wear cloth face coverings whenever they are in contact with others, unless — as in the case with actors — the production activity does not allow for the wearing of a face covering. Any latter such instances “should be of short duration and with as much physical distancing as possible,” though ideally “a minimum of 8 feet … during rehearsal or performance.”
- Any scenes requiring cast or crew to be closer than 6 feet must be as brief as possible and cast must be as silent as possible to avoid spreading droplets through talking. Scenes with direct prolonged physical contact between cast (intimate scenes, fight scenes) are discouraged at this time.
- All cast shall wash or sanitize hands when beginning the filming of a scene and not touch their face during the filming session.
- Large crowd scenes should be avoided.
- Hair and makeup services “should be limited only to cast that require it and cannot do it themselves.”
- Symptom checks are conducted before employees may enter the workspace.
- Studio audience members can include paid staff, and must be seated at least 6 feet from each other and wear face coverings whenever feasible. Audiences should be limited to 100 people or 25 percent of the maximum occupancy of the space (whichever is smaller).
- There must be regular, periodic testing of the cast and crew on a given production to mitigate the risk of the spread of COVID-19, especially for those cast and crew that are involved in high risk scenes requiring close contact without face coverings for extended periods of time.
- Each production must assign a COVID-19 Compliance Officer or Officers, responsible for establishing and enforcing safety protocols.
Cartoons may be the easiest way for networks to go. Here’s the line-up for networks in September.
Sept 1 – NBC – Transplant
Sept 7 – NBC – American Ninja Warrior
Sept 10 – NBC – Football Night in America
Sept 13 – NBC – Football Night in America
Sept 14 – ABC – Dancing With the Stars
NBC – Monday Night Football
Sept 18 – The CW – World’s Funniest Animals
Sept 20 – ABC – Emmy Awards
Sept 21 – Fox - L.A’s Finest
Fox – Filthy Rich
Sept 22 – Fox – Cosmos
Sept 27 – (all on Fox)
The Simpsons
Bless the Harts
Bob’s Burgers
Family Guy
Oct 4 – The CW – Pandora
The list for cable and streaming can be found HERE.
photo: getty images