Screen Actors Guild Moves Toward Strike

Hollywood is preparing for another crippling strike after the largest actors’ union failed to agree on a new contract with the US entertainment industry’s key studios and networks.

The 120,000-member Screen Actors Guild has been locked in talks with the studios for several weeks, with both sides working towards a deadline of midnight last night.

But it became clear yesterday that the deadline would not be met, paving the way for a repeat of the strike by Hollywood screenwriters that began last November and paralysed the industry for three months. That strike cost the California economy more than $2bn in lost revenues, according to the Milken Institute, a think-tank.

Any strike by actors could potentially cause as much damage to the state’s economy and also hit other US states that rely on the entertainment industry, such as New York, Louisiana and New Mexico.

SAG is also at loggerheads with the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, a rival acting union, which has accepted a contract offer from the studios.

Aftra, a smaller union with about 70,000 members, has agreed to a contract that would guarantee its members a bigger share of revenues from the airing of their work on new media platforms.

Meanwhile, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents the studios, said the industry was “shutting down” because “SAG’s Hollywood leadership insisted on 11th-hour negotiations and dragging these talks into July so they can continue attacking Aftra”