Actors strike looming as contract deadline nears

With a deadline of midnight Wednesday evening looming, and no signs of movement toward a contract agreement, a strike by Hollywood actors appears increasingly likely — a move that would put performers on the picket lines with writers who walked off the job more than two months ago.

Amid a flurry of 11th-hour activity on Tuesday, the SAG-AFTRA union announced it had agreed to a “last-minute request” by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers for federal mediation, but it refused to again extend its existing labor contract past the 11:59 p.m. Wednesday negotiating deadline — after which a strike could be called.

“We will not be distracted from negotiating in good faith to secure a fair and just deal by the expiration of our agreement,” according to the union statement. “We are committed to the negotiating process and will explore and exhaust every possible opportunity to make a deal, however we are not confident that the employers have any intention of bargaining toward an agreement.”

The union also blasted a report that emerged earlier Tuesday in the trade publication Variety, suggesting that various Hollywood heavyweights — including Disney CEO Bob Iger, Netflix’s Ted Sarandos and Warner Bros./Discovery’s David Zaslav — had initiated the idea of federal mediation. According to the union, the story was published “before our negotiators were even told of the request for mediation.”

“We will not be manipulated by this cynical ploy to engineer an extension when the companies have had more than enough time to make a fair deal,” according to the union.

SAG-AFTRA’s contract was initially set to expire on June 30, but the union and the AMPTP agreed to an extension so they could continue talks. The actors union represents about 160,000 performers.

Variety and Deadline both reported Tuesday that the heads of Hollywood’s major talent agencies — Ari Emanuel of WME, Bryan Lourd of CAA and UTA’s Jeremy Zimmer — recently reached out to the SAG-AFTRA leadership to offer their help in finding a path to avoiding a strike. According to Deadline, SAG-AFTRA officials were receptive to Emanuel’s offer for assistance, but it was unclear what form that might take.

The contract negotiations have been conducted largely under a mutually agreed-upon media blackout, so there have been no public updates from SAG-AFTRA or AMPTP on the status of the talks.

The actors’ union is focusing on many of the same issues that pushed the Writers Guild of America union to call a strike on May 2, including calls for revised residual formulas for streaming content and protections against the use of artificial intelligence in film and TV production.

The actors union has not gone on strike since 1980. The WGA went out on strike for 100 days starting in 2007. If SAG-AFTRA calls for a strike, it would be a rare double-barreled labor action, effectively shutting down what little production was still occurring since the writers walked off the job.

Negotiations between SAG-AFTRA and AMPTP began on June 7.

The AMPTP has already reached a three-year contract deal with the Directors Guild of America. The pact was overwhelmingly ratified by DGA members on June 24.

The DGA-AMPTP deal includes a 12.5% salary increase over a three-year period for directors, plus a “substantial” increase in residuals for streaming content — including a 76% increase in foreign residuals for the largest platforms and mutual confirmation that artificial intelligence is not a person and cannot replace the duties performed by DGA members.

That deal came after less than a month of negotiations, ahead of a June 30 expiration of the DGA’s previous contract.

More from The Industry