Striking Developments

Backstage.com, 10.9.08
By Andrew Salomon

"As world stock markets falter, SAG considers a work stoppage."

For several years, Scott Winters has supported his wife and two children by working as an actor. Since midsummer, however, when a contract stalemate between the Screen Actors Guild and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers began to harden, the actor's steady stream of screen work has nearly dried up. "It's been like shutting off a spigot," said Winters, a Providence, R.I., resident who has roles in the Showtime series Brotherhood and the upcoming Mel Gibson movie Edge of Darkness. "I think we had six or eight studio films in [Providence] up until the summer…and now there's one."

Because there are far fewer jobs, actors who live and work outside of Hollywood can be more vulnerable to the vagaries of show business than their West Coast counterparts. But every performer around the country could soon feel the squeeze if SAG launches a strike against its employers, a possibility that inched closer to reality last week when the guild's negotiating committee passed a motion asking the national board of directors to send a referendum for strike authorization to members. The next national board meeting is scheduled for Oct. 18. Full article