Actors' union agrees new pay deal

AFTRA said 62% of its members who voted agreed to the new deal

The smaller of Hollywood's two acting unions has approved a new prime time TV contract with Hollywood studios.

The American Federation of TV and Radio Artists (AFTRA), which represents 70,000 people, said 62.4% of those who voted had accepted the three-year deal. But the larger Screen Actors Guild (SAG) claimed the agreement undermined its own talks for a richer deal, which are ongoing.

The Guild's contract talks reached a stalemate last week.

AFTRA's deal won final approval despite an unusual all-out campaign by SAG urging some 40,000 actors who belong to both unions to vote against it.

Actors Jack Nicholson, Viggo Mortensen and Holly Hunter endorsed a Guild advert calling for AFTRA to return to the negotiating table to get a better deal.

'Substantial gains'

SAG leaders had said a "no" vote would give them leverage to negotiate a more favourable settlement with studios for all actors.

But AFTRA leaders said they had secured the best terms possible without resorting to industrial action, including higher basic wages and new reuse fees, known as residuals, for online content.

Robert De Niro warned actors against striking earlier this week

"A majority of members ultimately focused on what mattered - the obvious merits of a labour agreement that contains substantial gains for every category of performer in both traditional and new media," AFTRA president Roberta Reardon said in a statement.

The terms of the new deal are essentially the same as those the Hollywood studios presented to SAG last week as a final offer.

Talks between the two broke off hours before their existing contract expired.

The Guild is disputing some of the same issues that led to a 14-week screenwriters strike last year, especially how artists should be paid for work created for and distributed over the internet.

SAG plans to deliver its formal response to the studios on 10 July.

"We will continue to address the issues of importance to actors that AFTRA left on the table," SAG president Alan Rosenberg said in a statement.

"We remain committed to achieving a fair contract for SAG actors."

The contracts of both unions expired June 30, but both agreed with the studios to keep working under the old terms to avoid a shutdown of the entertainment industry.

Nonetheless, Hollywood has already slipped into a "de facto strike" mode, as major studios have halted most of their film production to avoid the possibility of costly labour disruptions.

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