Entertainment Industry Labor Relations

Actors Reach Tentative Agreement With Producers: Representatives of the Screen Actors Guild and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists reached agreement on a new three-year contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers for theatrical and TV movies. Details were not disclosed. The existing contract is scheduled to expire on June 30. Negotiations started on Feb. 7.

Talks are scheduled to resume Friday in the wake of Disneyland union members' rejection of a proposed three-year contract, officials said Monday. The talks will be at the Buena Park headquarters of United Food and Commercial Workers Local 324, one of five unions involved. The unions represent about 3,000 Disneyland employees, which make up about a third of the wintertime work force at the theme park, Orange County's largest private employer.

Slower national growth, coupled with surging California energy prices and the potential for bitter Hollywood strikes by writers and actors this summer, will make 2001 the most turbulent economic year for Los Angeles since the Asian economic crisis three years ago, according to the latest forecast on the region's economy for 2001. The report, issued Tuesday and prepared by Chapman University in Orange, stopped short of predicting a recession either in the region or nationally.

If Hollywood goes on strike this summer, entertainment industry workers can try to soften the economic blow by taking steps in the next few months to bolster their finances. "Now is a very good time [for them] to get a handle on their money," said Eric Bruck, a Culver City financial planner. Here are planners' recommendations for strike preparation: Create an emergency plan.

* Writers and studios, which have been negotiating since Jan. 22 on a new labor pact, said they exchanged new proposals that they will evaluate over the three-day holiday weekend. Negotiators on both sides plan to reconvene separately Tuesday to discuss them. The contract between writers and the studios expires May 2.

Veteran Hollywood labor strategist Brian Walton was hired Friday as the chief negotiator for actors in their upcoming labor talks with film and television studios. Walton's hiring by the Screen Actors Guild sets the stage for the union, whose contract expires on July 1, to formalize its demands and schedule negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

Nearly all men can stand adversity, but if you want to test a man's character, give him power. --Abraham Lincoln * It's generally accepted within the entertainment industry that when someone holds a gun to your head and issues demands, he is committing robbery. When you do the same, you're exercising leverage.

Hollywood studios and writers over the last six weeks barely inched toward a resolution of critical financial issues to avert a possible strike, despite an impression in the industry that they were making progress, according to participants on both sides of the contract talks. Although negotiations between studios and the Writers Guild of America did not break off formally until Thursday, both sides say they realized talks would be fruitless almost immediately after they started on Jan. 22.

Threatened strikes by Hollywood writers and actors--although big news in Southern California--remain low on the list of concerns for most lawmakers here. "People in Washington look at it like a baseball or basketball strike--they think of big-money stars like Julia Roberts, Brad Pitt," said Rep. Mark Foley (R-Fla.). "They don't really understand the nuances." In fact, the strikes would have little noticeable impact on Hollywood's superstars.

En route to the academy's annual nominee luncheon last week, "Gladiator" producer Doug Wick was surprised to hear his driver turn and ask, "If there is a strike, what will that do to the limo business?" "Then one of the other nominees at the table said their driver had brought up the same subject," recalls Wick, whose film is up for best picture.