The Hot Blog

The question is, can Doug Allen and Alan Rosenberg be forced into signing the deal that is on the table? That is what I believe membership now wants, in the majority. (Yes, a guess on some level. But how many really dispute this… and is the vote delay anything less than confirmation from within?) Well, Rosenberg says he will do it if there is not support for a strike. So…

AMPTP has the offer of synchronized contract end dates for WGA and SAG in 2011 on the table… but history has shown us that once precedent is set, it doesn’t change much. So the idea that 2011 will bail SAG out is not too realistic. And by the end of 3 more years, it wouldn’t be shocking anymore for SAG to handle movies only and AFTRA to oversee all of television. This is where we have been heading since AFTRA started being more generous to producers of “taped” television that SAG was. This is where AMPTP is heading, it seems to me. It all makes perfect sense… to everyone but actors who want to make a living and will never be marquee stars. A merger will blur this more, but at some point, the interest of film actors will be discarded by a merger actor’s union and a movement to restructure will emerge.

Anyway…

I think it’s all over. A deal gets signed shortly after The Oscars. Doug Allen is marginalized or gets a settlement allowing him to take all the money and go get a job with some other union that’s going out. Rosenberg resigns. And on to the AFTRA merger.

And in all the in-fighting one very simple detail is forgotten. No one at SAG wins. AMPTP wins. 5 for 5.