Actor Mark Roman's Strike Recovery Fund

Hi, my name is Mark. My stage and screen name is Mark Roman. (Yes officer, I realize it says Mark Nehls on my ID card.) I'm an unknown background actor. You may have seen me in your favorite crime procedural TV show or period piece film. I'd get more specific, but I'm a SAG-AFTRA union actor on strike, and we are not promoting the shows and films of the studios against whom we are striking. Speaking of which, you may have heard my President Fran Drescher explain how 86% of the 160,000 members of my union do not earn the $26,470 a year required for union health insurance. I'm one of those. And even though my other acting gig is a live performance improv comedy act, it effectively promotes a struck show and a film that is really big now. So that gig (which is best during football season), is on strike as well. $70k a year is considered low income in Los Angeles, where I live and work. If we are on strike for another 6 months, that's $35,000. America tried Universal Basic Income during the pandemic. Then we stopped. And one cannot collect unemployment while on strike in California. So here I am.

While I certainly have financial need, consider my 160,000 fellow SAG-AFTRA members. In conversations with them in person, in Zoom calls, and on the picket lines during our strike (and previously, the ongoing writer's strike), I find we all fear sharing what our actual need is. We are so conditioned to not "be difficult" or give ANY reason to not cast us, that we literally brainwash ourselves into thinking we do not deserve to ask for help. Especially when we absolutely need it. We have much less in common with the celebrity actors you watch. We have much more in common with people you know who are in a union, looking to organize one, or are already on strike. People you know like truck drivers, hotel workers, auto workers, baristas, warehouse workers, food servers, and workers in many more industries now experiencing this "Hot Labor Summer". We all struggle under the heavy yoke of what Kathleen Sharp in The Guardian calls "greed".

I wrote an open letter to George Clooney about how his $1 million donation to the SAG-AFTRA Foundation is much appreciated. AND we need to immediately start talking about, promoting and donating to Personal Strike Funds. This is mine. $150 was raised prior to GoFundMe, so my goal is not $35k, it is now 34,850. And I plan on donating 10% of net donations from this GoFundMe to the Personal Strike Funds of fellow union workers on strike. As my financial needs ease, I look forward to raising that percentage. Thank you for your consideration!