Doug Allen held his ground amidst much panic induced by certain forces (let’s say A-List actors who also tend to be producers who also tend to be in bed with producers) and those without sufficient foresight or backbone to believe that we can withstand the temporary uncertainty of a strike in exchange for a fair pay scale in the realm of online and emergent media.

Here is the letter from Allen in its entirety:

My Fellow Screen Actors Guild Members,

Yesterday, on January 26th, a slim majority of our National Board voted to fire our National Executive Director and Chief Negotiator, Doug Allen. This was not accomplished in a face-to-face Board meeting, where the significant minority would have had an opportunity to voice its opinion and where Mr. Allen would have had a chance to face his accusers and address their concerns. Instead, this drastic action was accomplished by “written assent”, the most undemocratic provision allowed by our Constitution.

As your twice-elected National President, I feel that it is my responsibility to give you my perspective on yesterday’s events, although my ability to do so is somewhat limited. The same majority, 52.52%, that fired Mr. Allen also voted to change our Board policy that designated the National President to be one of the official spokespeople for the Guild. As of yesterday, the only two people who are permitted to officially speak for Screen Actors Guild are our newly appointed interim NED, David White, and John McGuire, our Senior Advisor from New York. The members now have no official voice. I appreciate the fact that Mr. White thinks it is preposterous to silence a duly elected national officer, and so has permitted me this forum, provided I inform you that what I am about to write represents my opinion. However, although I am not writing on behalf of the Guild, I believe I do speak for the nearly 48% percent of the Board who are deeply concerned about what was done yesterday and about how these changes were accomplished.

Many of us believe that Doug Allen was fired because he was simply too good, too strong, and too much a unionist. His greatest sin was in challenging the idea that we be bound by the concept of “pattern bargaining”, under which actors have been disadvantaged for decades. Doug gave us the courage to accept the fact that we had a legal right to pursue an agreement that addressed the specific needs of actors; that it is unreasonable to think that the DGA or WGA, without asking any questions pertaining to actors’ participation in “new media”, could strike a deal that would adequately address the concerns of our 120,000 members and the diverse nature and needs of a membership that includes middle class actors, background actors, stunt performers, singers, dancers and our biggest stars. I, and the majority of our negotiating committee, were amazed by Doug’s skill as a negotiator and team leader, and by his diigence and breadth of knowledge. We were profoundly moved by his love for and dedication to actors.

I have no doubt that, if our Board had demonstrated any solidarity whatsoever, Doug and our committee would have arrived at an acceptable deal some time ago. Instead, members of that Board engaged in a systematic effort to sabotage these negotiations by passing motions that prescribed courses of action, and then repudiating those motions, thereby throwing our leadership into a state of chaos and our membership into a state of confusion. This was done consistently and, I believe, intentionally, so that our progressive leadership would be made to appear inept, which would pave the way towards a return to the go-along-to-get-along days of yore.

Now there is a new lead negotiator in the person of John T. McGuire. Our Negotiating Committee has been replaced by a new, more moderate Task Force. You can expect that not long after this new team enters the Bargaining Room, they will be offered some “plum”, some concession from the AMPTP that was said, heretofore, to be unattainable. This will be given by our employers, not as an act of good will, but as a demonstration of the fact that “reasonableness” will be rewarded, while “militancy” will be punished. Make no mistake, if this should occur, if there is any gain made, or if we are ultimately able to resist one of the massive roll backs that has been demanded, it will not be due to the skill of this new “negotiating team”. Anything that is won from this point forward will still be the result of the enormously hard work put in by Doug Allen and the majority of the negotiating team that has been in place since our W and W caucuses began a year ago this February. I am enormously proud of that team, led by Doug , of which I was a member.

We were able to change the discussion about these existing deals from the obfuscatory claims that they were somehow “groundbreaking” to a sobering dialogue, illuminating just how damaging these new media deals might be to the prospects of a middle class actor’s ability to make a living.

You should know that the ability to get things accomplished by “written assent” was also available to the progressive leadership that held the majority in the Boardroom prior to the most recent election. That Draconian option was never employed, however. Despite what has been said about that majority, they always made democracy their highest priority. They understood that a slim majority of 52% or 53 % gave no one the right to ride roughshod over a significant minority; they understood what the use of such a tactic would do to democracy in our union; they never desired to open that Pandora’s Box. Unfortunately, now it has been opened and precedent has been set. I, and the previous Board majority, have always been willing to compromise on any issue. Compromise is the way things get accomplished in a contentious democracy such as ours. To date, I have not been approached by a single Board member from New York, the RBD, or from the ironically named slate “Unite for Strength”, to try and find common ground on any issue. If these elected officials desire to move forward in any significant way in the name of the members, this behavior must change.

In unity,

Alan Rosenberg

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Now I present the other side of the argument by way of several videos featuring well-known actors including Elliot Gould, Rob Schneider and Martin Sheen strongly arguing for a YES from fellow guild members on the vote to strike.

Rob Schneider revealing how FOX TV plans to broadcast reruns exclusively online and not on TV airwaves (but without paying actors their current royalty/residuals rate, but instead only 3% of that for online play)

Elliot Gould makes an emphatic appeal and argument in favor of SAG moving to strike as he explains the media wash employed by the AMPTA to control the perception of the actor’s fight for a fair deal.

And Diane Ladd:

And Martin Sheen:

And me, Keram, who has been a professional actor for almost 30 years and who has given seminars and been invited to speak at conferences about the arts and new media can strongly state that SAG has my full support in moving to strike if it should require it.  The AMPTA claims that it needs time to understand and assess its online broadcast strategies and will be willing to renegotiate in three years.

That’s what they said about DVDs and it never happened.

Presently, the broadcasters are already streaming their programs, even the newest episodes in high-resolution, full screen, online and forcing the viewer to watch 15 second ads at regular commercial breaks, and yet they do not feel that actors should receive the same royalties (or in some cases, any at all) for these presentations.

SAG represents some 150,000 actors nationwide of which roughly 2% earn the majority of the money.  When one considers that the top 1% is earning twenty million dollars per picture, then it clarifies that the remaining percentile are not necessarily slouches, but they are mothers and fathers and brothers and sisters and people who contribute to society and work many other jobs.  The idea that actors live some sort of fantasy life or that they would want to strike out of greed is a gross misrepresentation of the reality.

The concern that many actors presently share about the downturn in the economy and California’s massive financial crisis making it a bad time to strike must remember that the renegotiation of this contract has been known for several years and the possibility of a strike has already slowed work for as long.  My feeling is – we are here, lets get it over with: thinking that delaying this for another three years will suddenly create confidence in the production landscape seems absurd – the only thing we will lose is the momentum and bargaining position.  As cinematographer Steve Gainer said on my podcast (and I am paraphrasing here) – do what we have to do, but let’s just get it sorted out so we can all move forward.  I agree – once a fair deal is struck we can just go back to making movies, television and online content and not suffer from the concern of mounting a production that could fall apart as the result of a looming strike.

So if you read this and are an actor or have dialogues with people who have the ability to vote on this, consider both positions but recognize that the time to get this deal done is now and the the guild needs the support of its members.

The post Many Well Known Actors Speak Out In Favor of SAG Strike appeared first on TheCulturepin.com.

As South Park eloquently illustrated, she is this year’s sacrificial lamb, whom they wait to execute in the town square so they can move onto their next virgin. Hannah Montana anyone? The druids did it because they wanted to please the gods, but what do we gain from this mania other than to stuff the holes in our psyches, those perturbed emotions and over-stimulated nervous systems, than junkie-level distraction?

But I turn this lens around on you now: how ya feelin? Little kooky?

If you want to know how to scratch that itch, check out nature. Try silence. Take a vow of silence for a week – don’t comment, don’t talk, don’t attempt to mitigate. Just focus on impartial awareness. If you embark upon this, I further recommend at least temporarily discontinuing exposure to the noise – of the radio, the internet, the television, the game console. Check in with your self and register What’s Up. This will be hard. It will feel like you are going crazy for a day or two or three as your mind grasps for something to satisfy its insatiable hunger for information. And then something will shift. You will begin to detox your nervous system and perhaps even, in recognizing your aversion to the mental clutter, begin to abhor it the way an ex-smoker abhors cigarette smoke.

I am not presenting anything here that you do not already know. I am simply substantiating that it is going on. Here. Now. Here. Again. Now. Like knitting. Loop in. Now here. Loop in. When you have reconnected to the immense richness of all the things around you in the present, your junkie-mode for all the attention grabbing drivel of the mainstream media will begin to appear as it really is – a desperate and petulant child crying out for your attention. You can either feed it, or let it exhaust itself and restore some equilibrium and have a good life.

And from that place, you will create. You will become a source. And then, I will blog about you.

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I am attending the National Association of Broadcasters convention this week. This year’s conference has a heavy focus on content creators. I am interested in hearing with what they want to populate the multiplicity of broadcast “solutions.” I do not have any disdain for the content creators; they have stories to tell and they need your attention to get the funding to tell them. some will bail out and fall prey to sensationalism. some will figure out a way to transcend that and win you over by virtue of a virally active word of mouth based on merit and innovation/genius. I look forward to reporting back to you.

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