What happens inside a union meeting might not usually grab public attention — but for thousands of performers in Canada, the decisions made by ACTRA Toronto directly affect who gets to work, who gets paid fairly, and who can afford to stay in the industry at all.
Now, as the ACTRA Toronto Council election approaches on November 11, one candidate is challenging the union to adapt to a rapidly changing world.
Performer and filmmaker Brennan Martin, an ACTRA member for 11 years, is running on a platform of transparency, collaboration, and modernization. He believes the union’s current structure—designed for a pre-digital era—hasn’t kept pace with how performers actually work today, especially in an industry reshaped by streaming, artificial intelligence, and the decline of traditional funding models.
“I decided to run because I’m an ACTRA member and a filmmaker, and I’ve seen that ACTRA has not been protecting its members like it should be,” Martin says. “If we need to survive, we need to make agreements with other unions to compete with films from the U.S. and the emerging threat from AI.”
A Union Built for Another Era
ACTRA—the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists—represents more than 30,000 professional performers across film, TV, radio, and digital media. The Toronto branch is the largest, electing a 24-member council to set policy, budgets, and strategy for the region.
Martin says many of the union’s policies were written for a time when filmmaking was slower and far more expensive.
“A lot of these rules were created decades ago, when you had to buy film stock to make something,” he explains. “ACTRA needs to update itself for the 21st century.”
He points to the Co-op Agreement, which governs small productions, as a major barrier for emerging creators. Under the current rules, only actors and one producer/director/writer can hold ownership in a co-op film—meaning cinematographers, editors, and other crew are excluded from owning their work.
“It was meant to protect actors, and that makes sense,” Martin says. “But what it does is separate us from other creatives in the industry, so crews and outside directors avoid working with ACTRA members whenever they can.”
He argues that this separation keeps independent filmmakers and performers from collaborating freely, pushing many to operate entirely outside the union.
The Commercial Lockout and Lost Livelihoods
Martin also wants to address the ongoing commercial lockout, a three-year-long dispute between ACTRA and ad agencies that has drastically reduced union members’ access to commercial work.
“It’s been devastating,” he says. “People have lost their homes, had to quit acting. It’s been really rough.”
He believes the lockout persisted partly because non-union talent filled the gap and because joining ACTRA remains unnecessarily difficult.
“It’s really difficult to join the union as an actor, and extremely painful,” Martin explains. “You need three union parts to become a full member, and in that period you’re prevented from doing non-union work. You still pay dues, but you don’t get voting rights or benefits. It’s an archaic system.”
Martin supports a “one-and-done” path to membership to welcome new performers back into the fold. He also believes the union should create its own creative campaigns to raise public awareness about the dispute:
“We’re creatives—so we should be creating content to shame those companies, entertain and educate the public, and win people to our side.”
“Fauxditions” and the Fight for Fair Casting
Martin is equally vocal about what actors call fauxditions—auditions held to satisfy “best efforts” rules requiring producers to audition Canadian performers, even when roles are already earmarked for foreign talent.
“We take time out of our days to learn lines, film an audition, edit it, and send it off just so they can say they tried,” he says. “Canadian actors are doing free work so millionaire American actors can come up and work on a set funded by generous Canadian tax credits.”
Under the current Preference of Engagement system, foreign-backed productions only have to make a “best effort” to hire Canadians. Martin believes that’s not enough.
“Producers come up to Canada because of our great tax credits and our cheap dollar,” he says. “We could be pushing for more representation in front of the camera. That’s what unions are for.”
Building a Modern, Transparent ACTRA
If elected, Martin says he’ll push for a new low-budget collective agreement that would let union actors and crews work together on independent films, sharing ownership based on their contributions.
“Everyone who works on a film would get paid the same rate and ownership would be shared with cast and crew depending on how many days they work,” he explains. “If the film does well, everyone makes money off that film forever.”
He also wants to see a dual-track system that keeps the traditional protections for large studio productions while introducing flexible rules for independent creators, as well as financial transparency within the union itself.
“ACTRA after the strikes, COVID, and the commercial lockout is hemorrhaging money,” he says. “If we speak to the membership about these challenges more openly, we can find real solutions together.”
A Vision for Canadian Film
For Martin, the stakes go beyond one union. He sees ACTRA’s reform as part of a larger cultural shift that could revive Canadian film’s global identity.
“Canadians simply aren’t watching Canadian shows and movies,” he says. “But indie filmmakers here are doing amazing things—like Skinamarink or Dream Eater—and they’re doing it outside the system.”
He points to filmmaker Matt Johnson (BlackBerry, Nirvanna the Band the Show) as an example of a Canadian artist proving audiences will show up for homegrown stories.
“We need to see ourselves as more than a service industry,” Martin says. “Keep taking those foreign productions, sure, but let’s also make kick-ass entertaining movies set right here in Canada.”
Election Details
The ACTRA Toronto Council election runs from October 31 to November 11, 2025. The 24-member council governs the largest branch of ACTRA, representing thousands of performers across the Greater Toronto Area.
Members in good standing can view candidate statements and vote at actratoronto.com.
