Workers at the Fantasia film festival staged a one-day strike on Thursday, a week before the festival is slated to start. Picketing outside 1455 de Maisonneuve West, workers told CKUT their main demands are higher pay and reclassification from freelancers to employees.
Fantasia is a genre festival showing mostly niche films in horror and sci-fi. It has been held yearly in Montreal for 30 years.
At peak time there are 60-70 people working the festival. CKUT News spoke to Justine Paris-Smith, Programmer of the Underground Section for the festival. She says that they decided to form a union in the summer of 2023 and have been negotiating their first agreement since then.
Festival management did not respond to a request for comment from CKUT.
