In observance of Labor Day on Monday, SAG-AFTRA members will refrain from picketing during the holiday. Now having been on strike for the better part of two months, Monday’s break is the first of the current work stoppage and will give guild members some time off before heading back to the picket lines later in the week.
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“To honor Labor Day, there will be no pickets on MONDAY, 8/4,” the union made in a tweet Sunday. “Enjoy the holiday, recharge, and be ready to join us on Tuesday, September 5th. We’re continuing this fight for a fair contract with unwavering determination. Together, we’ll make it happen!”
How long will the Hollywood strikes last?
After the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) and organizers from the Writers Guild of America kickstarted negotiations for the first time since the start of the strike last month, it appears the sides are once again at a stalemate with no end in sight.
“On Monday of this week, we received an invitation to meet with Bob Iger, Donna Langley, Ted Sarandos, David Zaslav and Carol Lombardini,” the WGA said in a member released on August 23rd. “It was accompanied by a message that it was past time to end this strike and that the companies were finally ready to bargain for a deal. We accepted that invitation and, in good faith, met tonight, in hopes that the companies were serious about getting the industry back to work. Instead, on the 113th day of the strike – and while SAG-AFTRA is walking the picket lines by our side – we were met with a lecture about how good their single and only counteroffer was. We explained all the ways in which their counter’s limitations and loopholes and omissions failed to sufficiently protect writers from the existential threats that caused us to strike in the first place. We told them that a strike has a price, and that price is an answer to all – and not just some – of the problems they have created in the business.”
“But this wasn’t a meeting to make a deal,” the memo continued. “This was a meeting to get us to cave, which is why, not twenty minutes after we left the meeting, the AMPTP released its summary of their proposals. This was the companies’ plan from the beginning – not to bargain, but to jam us. It is their only strategy – to bet that we will turn on each other. Tomorrow we will send a more detailed description of the state of the negotiations. And we will see you all out on the picket lines and let the companies continue to see what labor power looks like.”
