Jamie Lee Curtis, Jeremy Renner, Matt Damon.Photo:Rich Polk/Getty; Jesse Grant/Getty; Frazer Harrison/Getty
Rich Polk/Getty; Jesse Grant/Getty; Frazer Harrison/Getty
A number of Hollywood actors are showing support for a potentially imminent SAG-AFTRA strike after the union’s deadline for expiration of its agreements with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers passed.
As SAG-AFTRA presidentFran Dreschersaid in a statement that the union’s national board would meet Thursday morning to vote for a strike,Jamie Lee Curtis,Jeremy Renner,Matt Damonand Yvette Nicole Brown are among actors speaking out in favor of taking to the picket lines.
“I see a strike in my crystal ball,” Curtis, 64, wrote in anInstagrampost Wednesday, referencing her ghostly character Madame Leota in Disney’s newHaunted Mansionmovie. “The souls of ghosts of performers long past urging us in this modern moment to fight for our rights to exist as creators.”
Mario Tama/Getty
While Matt Damon spoke with theAssociated Pressat a London photocall forOppenheimerin London, the 52-year-old asserted that the union’s priority to protect working actors in the imminent strike is “unbelievably important.”
“We got to protect the people are kind of on the margins,” Damon told the outlet. “26,000 bucks a year is what you have to make to get your health insurance, and there are a lot of people who residual payments are what carry them across that threshold. If those residual payments dry up, so does their healthcare, and that’s absolutely unacceptable.”
jeremyrenner/Instagram
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“We can’t have that, so we got to figure out something that is fair,” he added. “Anyway, we’ll see where it goes. Nobody wants a work stoppage… It’s painful for every other guild. Really painful for IATSE and all our brothers and sisters there, nobody wants that, but we [have] to work under contracts that are fair.”
Jack Quaid, who also appears inOppenheimer, shared aTwitterpost Thursday that read: “If we must strike… THEN WE SHALL STRIIIIIIIIKEEEEEEEEE!!!!! #SAGAFTRA”
ActressYvette Nicole Brownearly Thursday shared multiple posts on Twitter noting she was ready to join a strike. “Now where are my comfy sneaks and shade hat?” she wrote in one post, in response to Sheryl Lee Ralph’s post announcing that the union’s contract had expired. TheDisenchantedstar also shared that she would be present for SAG-AFTRA’s Thursday morning meeting to vote on a strike decision and shared a hashtag that read: “#UnionStrong ✊🏾.”
In Drescher’s statement, issued alongside the union’s chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, theNannyalum wrote that the AMPTP “has refused to acknowledge that enormous shifts in the industry and economy have had a detrimental impact on those who perform labor for the studios” as she prepared her peers for a strike.
“Though we’ve engaged in negotiations in good faith and remained eager to reach a deal that sufficiently addressed performer concerns, the AMPTP’s responses to our proposals have not been adequate,” she wrote. “Our ninety-year history is a testament to what can be achieved through our conviction and unity. For the future of our profession, we stand together.”
source: people.com
