Recent Articles

Memo to SAG: How to Break the Template

Steve Diamond
September 06, 2008 18:09

(Link to PDF version on the right side of blog page.) As one listens to the interviews of the various candidates running for SAG's National Board, one theme comes through: no one is happy with the so-called "final" offer on the table from the AMPTP.  Those candidates who are supportive of either...

Hiding Behind Bars? UPDATED: SAG and U4S Respond

Steve Diamond
September 05, 2008 21:17

Some nice press coverage for Vallywood! today in Blog Stage. The issue is the "poll" that SAG's MF leadership wanted to send to the membership. The aim is to generate support for the MF strategy: delay, delay, delay. But they made one mistake: the staff of the union, from what I can tell, decided...

UPDATE: SAG Poll Outs Members? Nikki Finke’s Deadline Hollywood Daily Ignores Labor Law 101

Steve Diamond
September 04, 2008 02:04

UPDATE BELOW IN BOLD Nikki Finke is up to her old tricks again.   She maintains a fiction that she is an active supporter of Hollywood labor unions but then she attacks Jonathan Handel, arguing he is a shil for the companies, when, in fact, Handel, a former WGA lawyer, is quite friendly with and...

Membership First to Background: Drop Dead!

Steve Diamond
September 03, 2008 14:06

It seems that the prickly nature of Membership First activists is turning into an attack machine of the sort usually only witnessed on the national political scene. While Membership First claims that it stands for the interests of all SAG members, including background, let a single background...

This Disaster Is No Movie

Steve Diamond
September 02, 2008 14:51

As we lawyers like to say, res ipsa - this speaks for itself. This Disaster Is No Movie - CFO Magazine - September 2008 Issue - CFO.com

Panic in Needle Park?

Steve Diamond
September 02, 2008 07:18

Panic seems to be setting in at SAG Headquarters these days at least among the dominant Membership First faction. It's two months since the union's most important contract expired.  So for the first time in SAG history actors who are working - and there are widespread reports that production has...

Labor Day Special: How Obama could fix labor law

Steve Diamond
September 01, 2008 02:24

While American workers have been consistently disappointed by Democratic Presidents over the last thirty years, both of them, this article by my friend Bill Gould makes very sensible suggestions for a potential Obama presidency. With union density in the private sector at an historic low, the time...

Live Interview with leading SAG election candidates

Steve Diamond
August 30, 2008 02:29

Look at LA, Ustream.TV: Interview show focusing on entertainment industry and Hollywood, as. News,Interview,Journalism,Local News

Major studio film shoots in Los Angeles grind almost to a halt - Los Angeles Times

Steve Diamond
August 27, 2008 02:13

If accurate this story documenting the restructuring of film production schedules suggests again how the AMPTP outsmarted the current SAG leadership in the run-up to the June 30 Guild contract expiration.   It argues that the studios pushed schedules up so that they could last through the summer,...

Do the SAG elections matter? UPDATED August 7

Steve Diamond
August 23, 2008 04:47

Slates of candidates for the SAG board of director elections were announced yesterday as well as the names of several independent candidates.  The slates include the incumbent group Membership First as well as the new challenging group, Unite For Strength. Among the prominent independent candidates...