The deadline for the Screen Actors Guild contract passes at midnight, and there is no deal on the horizon. But there’s also no talk, as yet, of a strike. Hollywood can continue functioning under SAG’s now-expired contract, and for the moment that’s where things stand. My read, as I explained on John Hockenberry’s show "The Takeaway" last week, is that the union is in an historically weak position. The studios feel themselves to be in a win-win place. If there’s a strike, they can take it, and they have the benefit of having given little quarter during the painful writer’s guild strike earlier this year. Production has slowed to a near-standstill in any event. And if there’s no strike, they continue business, slow-go, as needed. Either way, they don’t seem to see a need to compromise on the guild’s demands for more money. Stay tuned, we’ll be following this.
Strike Deadline Approaches
