SAG ratifies new contract to avoid yet another Hollywood strike
The long Hollywood labor nightmare that began in November of last year officially ended yesterday when the Screen Actors Guild overwhelmingly ratified a new contract with the studios.Guild members voted 78% in favor of the new agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers (AMPTP), despite calls by hard-line union members who urged actors to vote "no" and force continued negotiations.
It's clear that two huge factors in the SAG approval were general labor strife fatigue and the struggling economy.
The Writers Guild started the ball rolling long before it actually went on strike in the witching hours of Halloween night, 2008. That led to a three-month work stoppage that many writers have yet to recover from as it changed the map of film and TV writing forever with arguable gains for the Guild. Many mid-range actors (non-superstars who need to work to survive) were worried about similar prospects if they held out against AMPTP much longer.
Meanwhile, the nation's economy tanked -- with California taking an even uglier tumble. The recession handed most of the bargaining chips to the studios as their coffers could survive a strike -- while most SAG members could not. In the end, the actors settled for what they could get.

2 Comments