## Facts

- Eric Glatt and Alexander Footman worked as unpaid interns on the film *Black Swan* in accounting/post-production and production roles, performing largely administrative and clerical tasks.
- Eden M. Antalik worked as an unpaid publicity intern at Fox’s corporate offices in New York City.
- Plaintiffs alleged they were “employees” under the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) and New York Labor Law (NYLL) and were owed minimum wage and overtime.
- In the district court, Glatt and Footman sought partial summary judgment that they were employees; Antalik sought Rule 23 certification of a New York class of interns and conditional certification of a nationwide FLSA collective.
- The district court granted partial summary judgment for Glatt and Footman, certified the New York class, and conditionally certified the nationwide collective, relying heavily on the Department of Labor’s six-factor guidance for unpaid interns.
- Defendants took an interlocutory appeal challenging the employee-status ruling and the class and collective certifications.

## Issues

1. What legal standard governs whether an unpaid intern at a for-profit employer is an “employee” under the FLSA (and NYLL).
2. Whether the Department of Labor’s six-factor test is controlling in determining intern employee status.
3. Whether Rule 23 predominance and FLSA “similarly situated” requirements are met when intern status turns on individualized circumstances.

## Decision

- The Second Circuit vacated the partial summary judgment ruling that Glatt and Footman were employees and remanded for further proceedings.
- The court adopted the “primary beneficiary” test, asking whether the intern or the employer is the primary beneficiary of the relationship.
- The court rejected treating the Department of Labor’s six-factor guidance as a rigid, all-elements-required test.
- The court vacated Rule 23 class certification because individualized questions bearing on the primary-beneficiary inquiry predominated over common proof.
- The court vacated conditional certification of the nationwide FLSA collective for substantially the same reasons and remanded.

## Legal Principles

- Unpaid intern status under the FLSA is determined by a flexible “primary beneficiary” inquiry grounded in the economic reality of the relationship.
- The primary-beneficiary analysis is guided by non-exhaustive considerations, including:
  - clear understanding of no expectation of compensation;
  - training similar to an educational environment;
  - connection to formal education (including academic credit);
  - duration limited to the period of beneficial learning;
  - work that complements rather than displaces paid employees while providing educational benefit; and
  - clear understanding of no entitlement to a paid job at the end of the internship.
- No single factor is dispositive, and the inquiry depends on the totality of circumstances.
- Class or collective treatment is inappropriate where determining employee status requires individualized proof that outweighs generalized evidence on common policies.

## Conclusion

The Second Circuit held that unpaid interns are “employees” under the FLSA and NYLL only when the employer is the primary beneficiary of the internship under a flexible, totality-of-circumstances test, and it vacated the district court’s employee-status ruling and class and collective certifications due to predominating individualized issues.


Glatt v. Fox Searchlight Pictures, Inc., 791 F.3d 376 (2d Cir. 2015)