With SAG's feature-primetime contract at its usual stalemate, the Screen Actors Guild and AFTRA have launched what's expected to be a month of negotiations with the ad industry over the commercials contract.
Talks began Monday morning at the Crowne Plaza in New York, with both sides presenting their opening statements amid a news blackout.
In a sign that negotiations are likely to be complex, negotiators have blocked out four weeks for the talks, starting with this week through Friday, followed by a break next week and a resumption on March 9. The contract, which has been extended twice, expires March 31.
Key demands for the actors include a 6% annual salary hike, based on the current contract, while advertisers are seeking a structural revamp of the compensation system based on gross rating points rather than the traditional pay-per-play method. Under the industry's proposal, thesps would continue to receive about $900 million in annual compensation, but would be shifted to reflect changes in viewing patterns.
In addition, the ad industry is seeking pension and health contribution caps after winning a court ruling over how disputes on P&H contributions are settled (
Daily Variety, Dec. 23).
The unions agreed in 2006 to a two-year extension so Booz Allen Hamilton could conduct a study on changing revenue models in the ad biz due to the impact of new media.
With SAG and AFTRA at loggerheads for much of last year over the feature-primetime deal, negotiators agreed late last summer to a five-month extension.
The two unions managed to put aside their differences in October, with the AFL-CIO brokering a peace agreement that included nondisparagement rules and a ban on raiding, leading to Monday's official return to joint negotiations.
Meanwhile, SAG and the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers remained at another impasse Monday. Neither side had any comment about the impending departure of News Corp. prexy Peter Chernin, who worked with Walt Disney Co. CEO Robert Iger last year in crafting contracts with the DGA and WGA.
SAG leaders have been hoping Chernin, Iger or some other industry heavyweight may intervene to bring an end to the guild's eight-month-old contract drama. The guild's national board rejected the majors' most recent take-it-or-leave-it offer on Saturday night, due to the AMPTP's insistence that the deal's expiration occur three years after the new deal is ratified, which would be March 2012 at the earliest.
SAG wants the expiration to be June 30, 2011 -- three years after its previous contract expired -- to keep it in synch with the end dates of the WGA, DGA and AFTRA deals.
Contact Dave McNary at
dave.mcnary@variety.com