Actors Labor Relations

A strike threat by actors that could have paralyzed Hollywood ended Sunday when representatives of actors and producers agreed to a tentative three-year contract that leaves unresolved the thorniest issue of how much performers deserve when their work airs on cable TV or in the booming foreign markets.

Hollywood's decade of labor peace may be ending. This week, representatives of the Screen Actors Guild sat down in earnest with producers for what promises to be the most contentious negotiations in years, largely over the age-old issue of residuals, the amount paid when shows are re-run. Some believe the gap between the sides is so wide that it could prompt the first strike by actors in 18 years and the first by a major Hollywood union in a decade.

Four actors who provide voices for the Fox network series "The Simpsons" are seeking to resolve contract negotiations with News Corp.'s 20th Century Fox Television, offering to sign for three more seasons in exchange for "further compensation at a later date." The impasse has become the latest test as to whether the television industry can hold the line on escalating salaries, especially in a case where the stars in question are heard but not seen.

Roman homemaker Michela Sportelli tuned in to "The Guiding Light" and struggled to follow the tangled plot: Will Reva escape her shipwrecked companion? Will Josh, after giving her up for dead, take Reva back? What will Josh do with the other Reva--the clone of his missing mate? But what really baffled Sportelli was this week's unscripted twist in her favorite soap opera.