Are we going to need to revive the Tuned In Strike Watch? Just as we’re seeing scripted TV return to air after the writers’ strike, there are some ominous rumblings regarding the actors’ contract, which comes up in June. This weekend, the American Federation of Televison and Radio Artists effectively split up with the Screen Actors’ Guild, saying that it would negotiate its contract separately. The surprise move was pegged to differences in approach—SAG is considered the harder-line union—and a dispute over, over all things, which union gets to represent the cast of The Bold and the Beautiful.
I don’t pretend to know whether this makes an actors’ strike objectively more or less likely, but judging by the coverage in the trades, the bad blood seems to be making people nervous. You don’t really like TV and movies that much anyway, do you?