New Rift Develops Within SAG

LOS ANGELES/NEW YORK, December 15: A bicoastal feud has
begun within the Screen Actors Guild (SAG), with the New York board calling on
its members to oppose a strike authorization vote, a move the union's national
president has called "destructive and subversive."

The union's New York board decided on Friday to tell its
members to reject the strike authorization vote that is being sought by the
national board, in view of the downturn in the global economy. SAG requires a
75-percent approval vote in order to call a strike.

Alan Rosenberg, the
national president of SAG, issued a statement noting: "The New York board
never asked me to call a board meeting, and they did not take the opportunity
to do so during our National Executive Committee meeting three days ago. In
fact, I have never been notified of their 'demands,' as their statement was
sent directly to the press, not the Screen Actors Guild. This action encourages
and emboldens the AMPTP and seriously harms SAG members throughout the country.
Apparently, some of the NY board members' responsibilities and obligations to
SAG members come behind their own political agenda."

Rosenberg has called
an emergency national board meeting to discuss "the ramifications of this
extraordinarily destructive and subversive action of the New York Board."
It is set to take place on December 19.

Meanwhile, the AMPTP has taken its position to the industry
trades with full-page ads today rejecting "Rosenberg's rhetoric." The
producers maintain actors would lost $2.5 million a day if a strike is called.

—By Mansha Daswani