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Zohran Mamdani‘s newly appointed commissioner of the New York City Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment, Rafael Espinal, has already lined up a meeting with Gotham-based SAG-AFTRA leadership to find out what the department could be doing to better serve the actors’ union as it enters new contract negotiations with Hollywood film and TV studios.
“We are prioritizing the workers who who run these productions. We’re going to be focused on finding ways to be supportive, to increase the amount of union jobs across the city,” Espinal, a former New York city council member and Freelancers Union executive director, told Variety on Monday. “And these productions are going to be one of those places we’ll be focused on. I actually am going to have a conversation later this week with the head of SAG-AFTRA here in New York, and I will learn more of what role we can play as an agency to ensure that we are creating good, paying jobs and opportunities for the actors.”
Traditionally speaking, this is not what the New York City Mayor’s Office of Media and Entertainment spends the bulk of its time doing.
The division — previously run by Pat Swinney Kaufman — is comprised of four departments: the film office, which coordinates on location production throughout the five boroughs; NYC Media, which is the city’s official broadcast network and production group; the press credentials office; and a programs and initiatives effort focused on workforce development across NYC’s creative sectors. It’s that last field where the office has had a hard time making a significant impact in recent years, even amid the 2023 SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes.
“That’s something we’re looking to focus on as we move forward: How do we transform the office as an office that has been, I would say, generally focused on the creative industries, but now flip that and look at the creative workforce?” Espinal said. “And how the office can play a much stronger role in creating programs and initiatives that are going to upscale the creative workforce here in the city, but also, connect them and create a pipeline to the opportunities that hopefully increase productions and opportunities that will create for them. We also want to reach out to more marginalized communities that may not have a clear understanding of how they can get into these opportunities and roles, and really focus on neighborhoods that have been often left out of these opportunities, and try to find a way to include them.”
This does not mean a sole focus on workers, as much of Espinal’s office’s job is to court the TV and film industry studios to prioritize shooting in New York City.
“I think we can all agree that New York City is known as the cultural capital of the world, especially when it comes to filmmaking,” Espinal said. “And I want to put a strong emphasis on ensuring that New York leads the country, if not the world, on how we can run seamless and efficient production permitting and applications to encourage more filming and more productions in our city, while also ensuring that when those productions come in, that they are creating opportunity for all New Yorkers who are interested in getting involved in these industries; that they can access a clear pipeline to the jobs and opportunities they create.”
Espinal said that “we have to remind people why New York is the premier place to shoot in the country,” adding, “And I’m going to be doing the work and reaching out to the folks in the industry and stakeholders who are leading these productions, especially the studios, and make sure that they understand that New York is serious about bringing jobs here and bringing opportunities here, so that we continue to stay competitive; not only in the country, but globally. As we know, there has been a trend of production moving to Europe and other parts of the world. We want to make sure that we bring that back.”
MoME has increased its focus beyond the NYC staples of theater, TV, film and music to include the video game industry. Espinal said he will be continuing this effort as he explores the potential of the gaming economy in New York.
“From my understanding, there has been a lot of investment and interest in the office of MoME and the role it can play to help expand the gaming industry here in the city, and that’s something I’m going to continue to look at,” he said. “We want to be able to diversify the amount of creative work that is available here and ensure that we have a strong creative economy in the city of New York.”
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