Spotlight: Joseph Scudiero, SVP & Chief Labor Counsel

“Every company manages employment and labor matters, and the focus on compliance becomes more important as labor and employment laws proliferate at the local, state and federal level,” says Joseph Scudiero, Entertainment Partner’s SVP and Chief Labor Counsel. Since 2011, Scudiero has been leveraging decades’ worth of experience to help EP clients – studios, production companies, and more – ensure they can navigate the legal landscape of the entertainment industry with ease.

An alumnus of Loyola University School of Law, Scudiero was admitted to the California bar in 1986 and quickly established himself as an expert in providing counsel on employment law and legislation to clients in the retail, financial, and entertainment industry. Among his clients was EP’s Labor Department, and he found himself drawn to the unique needs of the motion picture and television industry due to its transient workforce, unions, and distinct organizational structures.

Working with EP he enjoyed learning not only how the company operated, but the entertainment world as a whole. “It raises a lot of novel issues that you don't confront, for example, in manufacturing or industrial settings when it comes to labor law – or even law in general,” Scudiero explains. “For a labor lawyer, it's like Disneyland.”

In 2011, he joined EP outright, and over the last 10 years, has devoted himself to protecting clients from liabilities and helping ensure compliance in an ever-changing legal landscape – be it evolving union agreements or new federal and state legislation (like SB 973). “The law sometimes changes day-in, day out,” Scudiero half jokes.

When it does change, whatever the challenges, Scudiero makes sure he and his legal team are informed and in sync. When the Affordable Care Act was passed in 2010, it was unclear how the entertainment industry’s non-union workers – who frequently move from project-to-project – would obtain benefits. In response, Scudiero helped to design the award-winning EP Cares™, an ACA-compliant insurance program that addressed the needs of the industry’s vast non-union workforce.

That type of creative response is necessary to support the entertainment industry where legal needs are often nuanced. “Our business is so complicated that even if you were to look at just labor law, there are so many different parts of labor law now that have become more highly regulated and complex,” he says. In order to offer exceptional and timely advice, Scudiero and a team of six lawyers ensure they are informed and available to assist with a range of needs: employee benefit and general labor laws, supporting corporate HR departments and lawyers, intellectual property or privacy.

While assisting clients with the legal issues that may arise, Scudiero believes strongly in helping clients be proactive, not reactive, when it comes to labor laws. “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. In other words, companies that understand their legal environment and take compliance seriously, in advance, easily outperform their counterparts both financially and in terms of employee satisfaction.” To accomplish that with EP clients, Scudiero is guided by a philosophy he uses to ensure a job well done. “We need to know the business. If we don't know the business, we can't help the client achieve its business objectives in the most efficient and cost-effect manner while staying in compliance.” After a nearly 35-year career working for the entertainment industry, there’s no doubt Scudiero knows the business.