Huh? No SAG-AFTRA Lovefest After All?

COMMENTS (8)

• Oh for god’s sakes.

  How about settling this privately?

  This is absolutely ridiculous. Perhaps the SAG leadership should be chosen exclusively by the AFTRA leadership and the A, B, C, and D lists to preclude these types of pissing contests and power struggles.

  ‘Let us choose or we will demonize’

  Comment by no elitism here — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 2:04am PST  Reply to this post

• Disappointing only if you’re fervently committed to the destruction of film and television as we know it and the demise of SAG.

  Honestly Nikki, stop feeding the frenzy of strike madness. Television hasn’t recovered from the WGA strike and never fully will and a lot of industry professionals are still reeling from their losses due to the ill-handled writers work stoppage debacle.

  THERE’S NO APPETITE FOR A SAG STRIKE and both sides (with the possible exception of SAG’s overly militant and misguided leaders) are desperate to resolve the matter and get to work without looming threats in the offing.

  Clooney, Hanks, et. al. are right that SAG has more leverage right now than they will if they drag this thing out. The whole industry is making coningency plans and by the time SAG finally drags itself to the negotiating table studios will have a “strike if you want, we’ve already planned on it” attitude that won’t yield a better deal than they could get right now.

  I’m just so exhausted by your feeding of strike threat frenzy. Enough already.

  Comment by E — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 2:57am PST  Reply to this post

• If this is true, then so much for the very positive comments under SAG/AFTRA resolution.

  Comment by Becca — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 5:10am PST  Reply to this post

• “Unanimously adopted”?
  A Joint SAG/AFTRA anything?
  Something fishy about that.
  Two possibilities:
  Another MembershipFirst-style “unanimity” – wait until everyone else goes home then have a vote….
  or
  Institute “bloc voting” so soon in the process….

  Comment by Tom — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 6:46am PST  Reply to this post

• Ahhhh…here we start round two of the nail-biting “oh my God what’s going to happen next with an industry union?” b.s. again. More kindling for the controversy fire. The (DHD) “hits” keep coming!
  This kind of constant whining, complaining, and bitching is what makes me think of leaving this industry. If it isn’t one gripe, it’s another ad nausea. Reminds me of children in a room that will never get along, no matter what is negotiated. Spoiled perhaps?

  Comment by POST PRODUCTION GUY — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 8:38am PST  Reply to this post

• For E, here’s a great solution, stop reading Nikki. You don’t like what she says, go read Variety or LA Times, both will trash the actors just like they did the writers. Or read your studios internal memos.

  The rest of us like just fine what she says.

  You know, it occurs to be that this is turning into the DGA/WGA thing all over again, with everybody now bitching that SAG (WGA) should get on with settling, while the smug AFTRA (DGA) sits back and says ‘soon’… Well, I suspect the SAG wants to start ‘soon’ too, except everybody is screaming at them to set a date, while AFTRA keeps saying ‘sooner’ than ‘later’…

  Seems to me that member meetings are a good thing to find out what the members want and what the members are willing to take and what they are willing to fight for… not six months ago… not three months ago… not one month ago… but now and in the future… with the state that we are all in now. For all we know it may not be the same. We don’t know that the membership is going to vote for strike, and if actors, A-list or not, don’t want to have a strike, the place to express that is in those member meetings, not in a public forum where all they are doing is letting the studios know they are their lapdogs.

  Guess the only thing left to learn is if ‘soon’ means that the AFTRA will sell out its brothers and sisters like the DGA did, or if they learned anything from what happened.

  Comment by let Nikki talk — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 12:44pm PST  Reply to this post

• To “E” at 2:57 am:

  Stop being such an ignoramus and stop scapegoating Nikki.

  AMPTP wanted the strike and had a pre-determined timeline and strategy from early on. Your policy of appeasement doesn’t work and never has.

  The town was a pawn at their mercy. The wild card was the internet – they didn’t bank on the solidarity and communication and determination by WGA facilitated by the internet. The WGA had AMPTP right where we all wanted them and dropped the ball at the last minute, likely due to behind-the-scenes pressure from the selfish Dirty Thirty.

  Let’s hope SAG leadership doesn’t likewise squander a golden opportunity and cave to the bloated interests of a selfish select few.

  Rock on, Nikki. You’re awesome.

  Comment by Bruce — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 1:03pm PST  Reply to this post

• RE: “POST PRODUCTION GUY”

  Shill parade is out again. Interesting they are always in the guise of “post production guy” “btl guy” etc etc.

  Dear Shill:

  On behalf of this town, we sincerely hope you do leave this industry.

  If people protecting their right to a fair livelihood is whining, complaining to you, and if you can’t tolerate a business that is inherently volatile, you should pack up your selfish vitriol and leave.

  No one will be there for you when you decide it is ok to fight for your own paycheck.

  Meanwhile, the Teamsters sure aren’t shy about striking and demanding their due and turning this town upside down.

  So, cork your shill rhetoric and tell the AMPTP nobody’s buying this time around.

  Comment by Truth — Saturday March 1, 2008 @ 2:30pm PST  Reply to this post