Hamilton “not concerned just yet” strikes may jeopardise his F1 movie

Lewis Hamilton is hopeful a resolution will soon be found to the strikes which have disrupted work on his Formula 1 movie starring Brad Pitt.

Filming for the feature began earlier this year at a number of circuits including during F1 race weekends. Apple Movies are backing the project which Hamilton is co-producing with Top Gun Maverick creators Jerry Bruckheimer and Joe Kosinski.

However the American filming industry has been disrupted by a pair of strikes. The first, arranged by the Writers Guild of America union, began in May. Two months later the Screen Actors Guild American Federation of Television and Radio Artists followed them.

Hamilton’s film is one of several which has been affected by the strikes. However, due to the nature of their production, they have been able to continue some filming work.

The Mercedes driver is confident the film’s funders will not pull their backing as a result of the disruption. “I know that Apple is fully behind us and wants us to go ahead,” he said. “Everyone in the team is fully focussed on making the greatest movie we can. It’s just a matter of time.”

Among the issues which have provoked the strike are writers and actors’ concerns their income has fallen due to the rise of streaming media, and desire to protect their jobs from being taken over by generative artificial intelligence.

Hamilton is hopeful the disputes will be resolved soon. “It’s definitely not the easiest time, I think, for actors around the world,” he said. “But I think something will be resolved in the not-too-distant future.

“The positive thing for us is we’re still able to do some filming, still able to use stunt doubles, we still have editing and things we can do that with the stuff we’ve already caught.”

He added he is still giving input into the final details of the film’s plot. “I’ll be on calls with Joe next week as we continue to finish off the story,” he said. “There’s a couple of races we need to go through and talk about the wording and how it’s worded through the different races.

“So, I’m not massively concerned just yet.”

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