Here we go again. Hollywood braces for an actors strike

[Mr. Television]

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/26/ar...ref=television

Hollywood Braces for an Actors’ Strike


By EDWARD WYATT
Published: June 26, 2008

LOS ANGELES — Labor unrest continues to dominate the landscape in Hollywood, and the possibility of a strike by actors has large movie studios planning to shut down production after Monday and has television studios rushing to complete episodes of series scheduled to return in the fall or January.

Most major movie studios long ago scheduled their big projects to finish shooting by Monday, the expiration date of the contract between the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and the Screen Actors Guild.

Television studios meanwhile plan to continue taping new and returning series as long as possible, banking episodes scheduled for broadcast in the fall or the new year in case an actors’ strike interrupts production, as the strike by television and film writers did last winter.

It remains unclear whether there will be an actors’ strike at all. The first indication is expected around July 8, when members of the smaller of the two major actors’ unions, the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, known as Aftra, completes a vote on whether to ratify a new contract with the producers alliance.

Roughly 44,000 of Aftra’s 70,000 members also belong to SAG, which has about 120,000 members. So the Aftra vote is being viewed as a strong indicator of whether SAG members will support a strike. SAG itself has not yet asked its members to authorize a strike in case its negotiations fail.

SAG’s leadership is lobbying Aftra members to reject the contract offer because the larger union says it does not offer enough in minimum wages for major television series roles and does not secure adequate payments for the digital use of actors’ work. SAG is also seeking new rules on product placement and an increase in allowance for gas and travel costs.

The actors’ unions have already provided exemptions to dozens of independent film projects that do not rely on the major studios for financing or distribution, allowing them to continue production in case of a strike.

Coincidentally, an aftereffect of the writers’ strike, which ended in February, is what allowed television producers to begin production earlier than usual this spring on many returning programs, thus putting them in a better position to withstand a possible short walkout by actors.

“I don’t think the writers’ strike was good for anybody,” said Teri Weinberg, an executive vice president at NBC Entertainment who oversees current programming and development. “But it did allow people like Tim Kring and his team to go back and talk about stories and bank scripts and start production earlier,” she added, referring to the creator of the NBC hit “Heroes.”

Many serialized dramas like “Heroes” and Fox’s “Prison Break” did not return to the air after the strike, allowing their writers to start working on the next season’s opening scripts back in February, when they normally would be plotting season finales.

So, on Tuesday, the “Prison Break” cast was on location at the Wilshire Ebell Theater in Los Angeles starting production on next season’s fourth episode; normally at this time actors might not even have seen scripts for the season opener.

Katherine Pope, president of NBC Universal Television Studio, the production arm related to the NBC broadcast network, said that this June was busier than any in the more than 10 years she had worked in television.

“The business is finally moving toward everything being on its own natural production cycle rather than being shoved into a pre-existing structure that makes no sense for a particular show,” Ms. Pope said.

She was referring partly to the annual cycle of developing new programs, filming pilot episodes and deciding whether to add the series to a network’s schedule.

That process was greatly upset this year by the writers’ strike, which gave networks little time to develop, produce and screen pilots before having to announce in May, for advertisers’ benefit, which shows were joining their fall schedules.

Until recently advertisers had been reluctant to commit to buying commercial time in new series without seeing a full-length pilot episode. This spring, however, some networks sold as much as 80 percent or 85 percent of the available time for the 2008-9 television season during the advance selling period, more than the usual 75 percent.

“This season shows that you don’t have to give advertisers full-blown pilots to sell time,” Gary Newman, co-chairman of the 20th Century Fox Television studio, said. “That enables you to get the scripts into a better place before you start shooting.”

It also gave networks more time to cast new series, something that in most years is compressed into a few weeks in the spring, when all networks are competing for the same performers.

The changes have also led to a raft of pilots for shows being produced in the late spring and early summer. ABC Studios, a production unit that, like the ABC broadcast network, is part of the Walt Disney Company, is shooting 11 pilots this summer for shows that might enter the lineup in 2009 or later.

Television production was undoubtedly hurt by the writers’ strike. According to FilmL.A., an organization that tracks permits for location filming in Los Angeles County and nearby areas, the number of days of television production in the first quarter of 2008 fell by 45 percent from a year earlier as the writers’ strike left most programs without new scripts to film.

Feature film production rose by 11 percent in the same period, as producers rushed to finish projects that had already been written.

Now, in what is traditionally the slowest quarter of the year for television production, studios are working at full throttle. At the Fox studio “Bones,” a crime drama broadcast on the Fox network, and “My Name Is Earl,” an NBC comedy, both began filming new episodes last month, much earlier than normal.

In addition “24,” the serial drama that skipped all of last year despite having shot several episodes of its seventh season, is adding a two-hour episode to start next season and is likely to have its schedule of 24 episodes completed before the first one is broadcast in January.

This assumes that the actors do not walk out or — a more remote possibility — that studios do not lock out actors to force them to reach a work agreement.

Both actors’ unions have been trotting out celebrity backers, with Aftra using Sally Field, Tom Hanks and Alec Baldwin to promote endorsement of its proposed contract, and SAG planning a similar effort against the Aftra deal with Jack Nicholson, Rosanna Arquette and Holly Hunter.

The studios, meanwhile, are getting ready for the worst. “Obviously as a network we have to be prepared for that,” Ms. Weinberg of NBC said, without being more specific. “We’re incredibly hopeful an agreement will be reached. But we have a contingency plan.”

[catlover79]

Ay carumba!

[PunkyP0WER]

they're all overpaid and over rated anyway. i see more reality shows on the horizon

[70s show watcher]

Originally Posted by PunkyP0WER

they're all overpaid and over rated anyway. i see more reality shows on the horizon

and if thats the case i see more of my dvds being watched

[Brent88]

I don't think there will be a strike. The SAG has lost a lot of leverage here, I have serious doubts even if they do call for a vote it would get to 75%(which is required to strike).

and there is no sympathy for it like there was for the WGA. Every other Hollywood union has taken the deal. It makes them look really bad.

[comedyfreak]

Let 'em strike I have several dvd's I still need to watch anyway.

[TJL]

Another shortened/interrupted TV season will be a disaster. If the Networks worried about brining back viewers after the last strike, it will be worse for them if this one happens.

[James28]

If there is an actors strike in the near future, will it be the first one since 1980 because I haven't heard of any Actors strikes between 1980 and now.

[Mr. Television]

Originally Posted by Jim856796

If there is an actors strike in the near future, will it be the first one since 1980 because I haven't heard of any Actors strikes between 1980 and now.

You're right. The last time was 1980 and then the writers' struck in 1981. This would be the reverse if it happens.

[DSfan]

I wouldn't be surprised if all year we only have reality shows, if the strike happens.

They should air reruns of classic shows or air movies, anything but not reality.

New reality shows are soo bad. I can see them just shoving a camera in a popular bar in Chicago, for example, and just hoping some celeb or fight will happen. lol