Here’s a snippet from the AP article, reporting news that’s all over the (showbiz side of) the web today:
LOS ANGELES (AP) — The Screen Actors Guild plans to send strike authorization ballots to more than 100,000 union members on Jan. 2, a date that leaves the Golden Globes safe but puts Oscar night within reach of a potential boycott.
Votes will be counted on Jan. 23, nearly two weeks after the Golden Globe Awards ceremony, but ahead of the Feb. 22 Academy Awards, the most important date on the Hollywood calendar.
Approval by 75 percent of voting members is required to pass the measure. If it is approved, the SAG national board can call a strike.
Guild President Alan Rosenberg has said a strike is the last resort to force a resolution in stalled contract talks with major movie studios, but that if it is necessary, it would be timed to have the most impact.
“SAG members understand that their futures as professional actors are at stake,” Rosenberg said in a statement Wednesday.
There are several “unspoken” aspects to this news: The first is, SAG has thrown in with automakers, taking their “bridge loan” ’til New Year — and everyone else — just trying to hold on until “the crazy man leaves the White House.”
The second thing might be Rosenberg talking about various futures as “professional” actors, in an era where news reporting is already “secularized” — i.e., moving from professional citadels to blogs (for both better and worse), and where, similarly, “showbiz” is moving from your TV screen to your computer. Pilot season will commence on YouTube. Etc.
But of course, that’s already known.
What’s less acknowledged — everywhere, by everyone, actors, car execs, UAW reps, congressfolk, et al and etc. — is that the standard of living Americans have assumed is their due, from being first world “professionals,” is steadily eroding, unraveling.
and frankly, unlikely to ever come back in any resemblance of mid-20th century comfort.
James Howard Kunstler has an interesting commentary about it here. In the meantime, how’s that war over residuals comin’?
