OUR MISSION

PayUpHollywood started as a grassroots movement in 2019, in an attempt to bring attention to the pay inequities, abuses and struggles of many Hollywood assistants. In subsequent years, PayUpHollywood has campaigned for Hollywood studios and companies to pay support staffers a living wage, in an effort to both tear down the paywall that keeps historically underprivileged voices out of the industry and to ensure current support staff can afford to work in their current position. PayUpHollywood aims to provide resources and aid to current entertainment support staffers as well as ongoing data and information about entertainment support staffers to other groups and companies who want to be part of the solution.

OUR HISTORY

#PayUpHollywood is an organic movement that exploded online in October 2019 in response to a ScriptNotes conversation between hosts John August and Craig Mazin about assistants’ pay.

Hundreds of assistants, who had been privately sharing their experiences for years, began telling their stories on Twitter and elsewhere online, organized around the hashtag created by co-founders Liz Hsiao Lan Alper and Deirdre Mangan. Since then, #PayUpHollywood.

#PayUpHollywood is an anti-racist organization and believes the addressing these issues will help to break down the barriers keeping underrepresented groups from succeeding in Hollywood and promote inclusion and diversity at all levels in the industry.

PRINCIPLES

liz hsiao lan alper, co-founder & Co-Lead

Liz is a writer, activist, and twitter addict. Her credits include The Rookie, Day of the Dead, and Two Sentence Horror Stories. Alongside fellow writers Tanya Saracho and Michael Royce, Alper co-founded the Hollywood Support Staff Training Program, an intensive Writer’s Assistant/Script Coordinator bootcamp that equips candidates from traditionally underserved background with the skills they’d need to step into a support staff position in a Hollywood writers’ room. She has been a guest speaker on NPR’s The Frame, Planet Money, and KCRW’s The Business.

Deirdre Mangan, Co-founder

Deidre is a TV drama writer. Her television writing/producing credits include Roswell, New Mexico (CW), Midnight, Texas (NBC), The Crossing (ABC), iZombie (CW), and Do No Harm (NBC). She worked as a writers’ assistant, showrunner’s assistant, and script coordinator for several years before landing her first staff writing job. She holds an MFA in Writing for Screen and Television from USC’s School of Cinematic Arts, and still hasn’t made a dent in her student loan balance.

ALEX RUBIN, co-lead

Alex is a writer, support staffer, and activist. She started in theater as a playwright and lyricist while also working with Friends in Theater Co., raising money for Make-A-Wish by producing limited engagements of popular musicals, and mentoring with Craft Your Truth, helping unhoused LGBTQ+ young people to write and present their original work. Alex was the Showrunner's Assistant and Script Coordinator on Amazon's The Horror of Dolores Roach and is the Writers Room Assistant on an upcoming season of a popular Netflix drama.

Jamarah Hayner, Co-founder & Press

Jamarah is a political and communications consultant who’s worked for fifteen years in progressive issue and candidate advocacy. She has served in the campaigns or administrations of Kamala Harris, Gavin Newsom, Michael Bloomberg, Karen Bass, Barbara Lee, George Gascon, Chesa Boudin and the California Democratic Party among others. She is a co-founder of the Compton Pledge, a guaranteed income pilot currently helping 800 families in Compton, and is active on the board of directors of the Greater LA African American Chamber of Commerce, Healthy Air Alliance, Mercy Housing California, Miguel Contreras Foundation, Abundant Housing and Heidi Duckler Dance, and focuses her work on economic empowerment, criminal justice reform, affordable housing development, and environmental justice. She lives in Long Beach, where any non-work time is taken up entirely by her two dogs and unmanageable amount of houseplants.