Yesterday, SAG’s negotiating committee—and wouldn’t I really love to know who’s on it!—passed a resolution that basically pleads with the newly elected board to vote on whether or not it will ask its members to strike in order to get a better contract from the AMPTP. Just in case we all forgot, the contract they don’t like is the same one that the Writer’s Guild of America got after they went on strike. The AMPTP immediately proved they were more media-savvy than SAG by issuing a statement on the front page of its website, part of which reads:
Is this really the time for anyone associated with the entertainment business to be talking about going on strike? Not only is the business suffering from recent economic conditions, but if ever there was a time when Americans wanted the diversions of movies and television, it is now.
Ouch.
Meanwhile, 147,000 below-the-line workers in India’s rich movie industry went on strike yesterday. Those workers—which include the lighting technicians, the chorus girls, and the camera operators—called their action a “non-cooperation movement” à la Gandhi, but the studios aren’t having any of it. Over 40 shoots were affected, and at least one film that is expected to be released at the end of October has its opening date on the line.
And what are they asking for, you wonder?
On-time pay (usually, they get paid 90 days after a shoot is over), a 12-hour maximum workday, and improved safety conditions.
Kinda makes you really want to knee some American actors in the balls, don’t it?