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UPDATES WGA/SAG Start Process of Announcing Officer Campaign Slates
As I told you, the SAG slates are finally shaping up for September’s election. While Ken Howard declared Friday his candidacy on behalf of Unite For Strength for SAG President, today Anne-Marie Johnson declared her candidacy for SAG President on behalf of Membership First. Seymour Cassell is foolishly trying to play the spoiler as an Independent but few are taking his candidacy seriously. (He’s the numbskull who falsely told the trades that Doug Allen had been fired when he wasn’t — yet.) Not when so many vital issues will be decided.
Anne-Marie Johnson’s statement read:
“It is indeed a great honor to be asked to run for president of the Screen Actors Guild. I’ve been serving this union as a national board member for 12 years and its 1st vp for three. I’ve dedicated thousands of hours working hard to improve the wages and working conditions for all SAG members and to ensure that our members needs are met. The Screen Actors Guild is a wonderful talent union and I’ve been proud to be a member for over 2 decades. The next few years will be extremely challenging. Tough decision will have to be made. My ultimate goal is to help lead this union in the right direction to ensure that the Screen Actors Guild remains the premiere talent union for all actors and that the well being of our current and future members are always considered first.”
Ken Howard’s statement read:
“This election offers members a stark choice between two leadership approaches – attempt to go it alone or unite for strength. From 2005 through 2008, SAG experienced the divisive, go-it-alone approach of Membership First. They went to war with AFTRA, sought to marginalize New York and the branches, and repeatedly alienated other entertainment unions. Under Membership First’s leadership, SAG failed to successfully negotiate a single contract in 2008, which cost our members tens of millions of dollars. To make matters worse, it caused producers to take most new television production to AFTRA, resulting in still more lost work and benefits for SAG members. With increasing consolidation of media companies and new technologies transforming our business, we will pay dearly if we’re not smart and strategic about our future. I’m running for president as a Unite for Strength candidate because I believe the only way actors will get our fair share of the pie is if we’re united both internally and with our labor partners. If SAG members elect me and my fellow Unite for Strength candidates, we’ll make a clean break with the divisive leadership approach of Membership First and focus on building maximum unity with AFTRA and other entertainment guilds to give us real power when we sit down to negotiate contracts.”
Later tonight, I’ll have a whole WGA and SAG election package.
Editor-in-Chief Nikki Finke - tip her here.
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don’t wanna see these UFS idiots take over this union, but AMJ vs the beloved white shadow. i just think she’s got too many enemies and not enough juice. Martin S- ya let me down.
Well Ken, I don’t know. You say, “If SAG members elect me and my fellow Unite for Strength candidates, we’ll make a clean break with the divisive leadership approach of Membership First”- However Of the two statements, yours is by far the most divisive.
I find Ken Howard’s statement to be the most honest and truthful. Vote for Ken!
In the interest of fairness, you should solicit and publish Mr. Cassell’s statement too.
Why does Howard’s statement read like “that past leadership screwed us by taking hard stances that have cost us some money. I’m going to prostrate before the AMTMP due to fear of more business going to AFTRA and hurt SAG members in the long term by my panicked moves”?
I personally would like to know the name of EVERY board member who voted AGAINST saving the Motion Picture Home so I can personally vote them the hell out of office. Heartless.
I wanted to see some revisions in the ByLaws of SAG to see this written assent BS disappear. I want to see SAG creating it’s own work in house and distributed for commercial purposes or otherwise. Perhaps it’s own YouTube-esque place where actors can showcase SAG work.
But mostly I want to see cooler heads prevail. I want to see a unified SAG, not a divisive SAG; the kind that turned them all into Democrats and Republicans, us vs them. If it has to be this way then I don’t think we are doing our jobs and this will start all over again. And we can’t afford it. Having been to the meetings in my personal opinion I think Ann Marie Johnson is a diplomatic, cool headed leader who can fill the position if President very well.
The choices simply ABOUND!!!
I assume the educated actor can see Ken Howard’s comment is 10% “we need to work together and I’m the guy who knows how to work together” and the other 90% to trash talk, lambaste, and criticize everyone who came before he announced his campaign. Regardless of who did what to whom, it’s an odd approach to profess “working together” followed by shotgunning negative comments at anything that moves, has moved, or might move.
Mr. Howard, I don’t mean to educate you, but your alleged platform is diametrically opposed to the premise under which you are pretending to run.
And then Howard says of some membership leaders, “They went to war with AFTRA.”
Really Ken? Is that the way it went down? And he says “SAG failed to successfully negotiate a single contract in 2008.” Unlike what? As if UFS “negotiated” a contract in 2009? You just signed what the AMPTP handed you Ken. That’s not negotiating.
Let the circus begin…
What a horrendous choice.
I guess I’d be interested if I hadn’t spent nearly a year reading about SAG.
The lesser of two evils is still evil.
Good luck all!
I’d like to start a brand new actor’s union and put this one to rest. SAG is tired and tiring.
Who’s with me?
Where MF has proceed to torch our contracts and manipulate the rules of procedure so that nothing ever really gets done at the Board meetings but a bunch of screaming egos more interested in holding the spotlight or talking about controlling their husbands, some of the comments here are ascribing those actions to the new saner members of the board — talk about transferring your own skill set on to the opposition.
Zackery: Theatrical, commercial and soon Cable. And the leadership of the Guild did fire a broadside at AFTRA in 2008, and they did try to suspend Phase I well before AFTRA walked: by ignoring history and context you walk right into the folly of repeating history over and over again. Time to learn and move on.
I’m sure AMJ is actually a lovely woman(I’ve been told so by friends that know her), but when it comes to Guild politics she has become very divisive. Here are some of her own statements:
“If we don’t defeat it [the TV/Theatrical Contract] we’re certainly going to make it an embarrassing ratification, which is just as important.”Membership First Picnic (Youtube)
“We need to shame David White and John McGuire. They need to be shamed”
Membership First Picnic (Youtube)
The only way we will start healing this Guild is by booting out the most divisive members from the boardroom. Ken Howard has not called anyone any names, unlike both AMJ and AR, who have.
At least Ken’s not obnoxious and disliked.
Again:
UFS, NY, RBD, USAN wants to continue compliance as a negotiating stance, and merge with AFTRA, where there is “strength in numbers” as if the philosophical divide in SAG (as in any democratic entity) is going away upon merger. That’s not logic, that’s nonsense.
MF and it’s supporters, including many independents, like me, support getting a fair, hell, even good contract for SAG actors, and bringing all actors under one roof – SAG.
Read the article today in HWR that has Barry Diller looking for more ways to monetize the internet. What did this contract bring actors in that event? A really, really bad deal. Instead of a piece of the pie, a “you make money, we make money” deal? They have now locked in terms that will be the negotiating starting point in 2011, and no sunset clause or union alignment will save SAG from the same threat then: fight to get what we signed away, or watch our ability to make a living disappear.
All the rest: the bitching and moaning, the revisionist histories, the attacks and counter-attacks, the conspiracy theories – is smoke.
Actors will vote after taking a look in their wallets to see what UFS has brought them
Anne-Marie Johnson. Great. Because there’s nothing better than a president who is suing the union even as she announces her candidacy. Suing the union over written consent… which she and her cohorts just used to put a Membership Approved replacement in Justine Bateman’s former seat. Hypocrite much, AMJ?
I do not know Ms. Johnson personally, but Howard’s candidacy scares the hell out of me. Given that he openly and seemingly proudly boasts of how ignorant he is of details and specifics – his wife reads the reports and tells him what she thinks he should know – why isn’t SHE the candidate?
The guy is under the impression that those who don’t have a series guest starring role every few weeks aren’t “real actors,” and the income he’s suggested TO ME as a reasonable minimum for voting participation by members reflects that belief.
He’s a perfectly congenial, nice guy with some impressive credits, especially early in his career. I love chatting with him. There’s no way in hell I want him anywhere near the executive offices of a union, and anyone who does either agrees with his indifference to actors beneath his quote, or has been wildly misled by those eager to see him at the helm.
I look forward to ANY opportunity to see both candidates take extemporaneous questions from the membership.
zipped writes, “The only way we will start healing this Guild is by booting out the most divisive members from the boardroom. Ken Howard has not called anyone any names, unlike both AMJ and AR, who have.”
If there is anyone who sees UFS and all its members as anything but divisive, first with and aggressive push for affected-member-voting and then using the never-before-necessary-and-still-not-necessary letter of assent to subvert the democratic process, they are simply not paying attention.
Zipped, you of of course entitled to your opinion. But when it comes to facts you are purposely misrepresenting history.
The last year has been a mess for SAG members and on a larger scale for Americans. Honestly I think if we all didn’t disregard our own ability to think most of it could have been avoided. It’s time to give up the comfortable idea of “they must know what they’re doing.”
Finger-pointing, as fun as it is, never really solves problems but does impress those who refuse to think. In fact the latter often repeat what the finger-pointer’s have said believing that kind of thing is a solution. It’s actually the problem.
It’s not about “compliance”, it’s about treating our colleagues in the industry as “collaborators”, not adversaries. It’s a lot easier to be respectful, working together to meet a common goal, than the torched earth strategy of Anne-Marie Johnson and those that buy into her skewed view of how an actors union behaves.
I think Anne Marie Johnson is a great choice – she seems dedicated and like one of the more “together” people in all of the meetings I’ve been to.
Clancy Brown … where are you?
Anne-Marie Johnson conducts herself very professionally in her volunteer elected work for the Screen Actors’ Guild, and will make an excellent president should she be elected.
I am also heartened to see level-headed actors like Martin Sheen and Ed Harris step up and offer their services to the Guild, should the members choose to elect them. Membership First has put together a strong and dedicated slate of actors for the regional and national boards.
Should have added this to my prior comment.
While it is true that Membership First has a handful of high-profile actors on its slate, it’s also true that these actors have spoken publicly, forcefully, and intelligently to issues of great import to the Guild. This is not a case of, “I’m famous, vote for me”; it’s more accurate to say that these are actors who have demonstrated excellence in their craft as well as passion for protecting and improving the wages and working conditions of their fellow thespians. Martin Sheen in particular is also fearlessly outspoken on causes he cares about, damn the professional consequences. Ed Harris strikes me as a guy who doesn’t suffer fools gladly, who prefers to get right to the heart of the matter. SAG’s Hollywood Board could benefit mightily from their contributions.
It’s funny, zackery, that you talk about finger pointing as though it’s something you’ve never done. The last year has been hell, but to accuse any “moderate” member of not thinking, and not say the same about the group that has led us down this dark path, is to pull blinders over your probably otherwise smart eyes. The assent was necessary. Why? Let’s walk it through: all contracts were stalled, nothing, absolutely NOTHING was moving forward. Then, when the newly elected board majority — like it or not, they were not pulling the wool over the working THINKING membership who voted for them — tried to fire Doug Allen, they were met with a 24 hr. filibuster. How is that democratic, in your opinion? I ask you to refute anything I’ve said in this, or any other thread. Are you saying, O smart one, that SAG didn’t try to suspend phase I? Are you saying that they didn’t try to re-jigger the neg. com so that only SAG members had a vote(bloc voting, remember that one? Please explain how that is democratic?). Are you saying Doug Allen didn’t fire a broadside at AFTRA cable contracts, PUBLICLY, in SAG Actor magazine? Are you saying that AMJ is not suing the union? Kent McCord(he needs to really move on from the board room)? Alan Rosenberg, our president, is suing his own UNION? Or in your universe, is he not actually suing, but striving for the common good, even though the commoners have told him to zip it?
I agree with you completely that finger pointing is the problem. I’m reminded of a show I was in, years ago, in upstate NY. An actor kept going up on his lines, even in performance. Whenever he did, he would point at the other actor on stage with him as though he were the problem. MF is no different. Their policies — and I again reiterate that their ideals are NOT suspect, but the manner in which they try to attain them, is — which includes a ton of blame heaped on anyone but themselves, have been a disaster. They are now finger pointing at the other players on the stage as though it is their fault. I have witnessed behavior by many of them in the board room, and it is remarkably unpleasant. We’re all actors. We should be able to have a disagreement, and still remain civil to each other. After all, we may have to work together.