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SAG negotiating committee considers seeking strike vote

By Richard Verrier
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Now that the studios have rebuffed an offer from the Screen Actors Guild to resume formal negotiations, expect things to get ugly fast.

The union’s negotiating committee will decide Wednesday whether to seek strike authorization from members should SAG and the studios reach an official impasse -- or defer that decision to the national board. The board meets Oct. 18.

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Strike referendums require approval by 75% of voting members. That may be hard to achieve given the dire economy. But a majority of negotiating-committee members believe SAG has few remaining options, short of capitulating on key demands over new-media pay, guild insiders say.

The national board already gave the negotiating committee authority to seek a strike vote. However, the board could still vote to disband the committee, given the election of new directors who challenged the guild’s leadership.

-- Richard Verrier

Company Town Blog
Richard Verrier

Richard Verrier is investigations editor for Arts and Entertainment at the Los Angeles Times. He has been with The Times since 2001 and has run our Company Town since 2016. After stints at the St. Petersburg Times and the Orlando Sentinel in Florida, Verrier joined the paper as a reporter, and for many years covered all aspects of the entertainment industry before turning to editing. He oversees the Company Town coverage while working to guide and edit investigative and enterprise reporting across the entertainment team, collaborating with writers and editors from all departments. He is a native of Montreal and a graduate from the University of Toronto and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism.

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