SAG: The Actors Will Not Do The Globes

Just minutes ago came the hardly unexpected announcement (that still, for NBC and the Hollywood Foreign Press Association, has to still feel like a kick in the stomach) from Screen Actors Guild President Alan Rosenberg:

After considerable outreach to Golden Globe actor nominees and their representatives over the past several weeks, there appears to be unanimous agreement that these actors will not cross WGA picket lines to appear on the Golden Globe Awards as acceptors or presenters," he said. "We applaud our members for this remarkable show of solidarity for striking Writers Guild of America writers.

The news at least temporarily supplants the hand-wringing over Jay Leno's strike-unfriendly monologues--though the Tonight host got sideswiped further down in the release, without being named, with the information that SAG is encouraging its members to do the two Worldwide Pants shows that have waivers from the WGA, and no others. (Show biz consumers, set your DVR's to CBS--and score another point for the WGA's Patric Verrone as Dave and Craig Ferguson get to stuff their slates with A-list talent. See here our September post about the Verrone-Rosenberg nexus.) ) Said Verrone in a release:

We are grateful to our brothers and sisters in SAG for their continued solidarity and support. The entire awards show season is being put in jeopardy by the intransigence of a few big media corporations. We urge the conglomerates to return to the bargaining table they abandoned and negotiate a fair and reasonable deal with writers to put this town back to work.

Barring some deus ex machina move by NBC--which reportedly said they'll try to air a show anyway, though just how was not stated--this undoing of the telecast subtracts a genuinely fun if feathery evening of enthusiastic boozing and the kind of speeches that go with that. So, to this viewer it means the disappointment of no televised sweep by 30 Rock (and the show's juciily dark duet of Tina Fey and Alec Badwin), no last call to come on down for The Sopranos' Edie Falco, no walk to the stage for Big Love MVP Bill Paxton. And it takes a good shot at public applause away from certain Globe candidates who will have a harder time getting Oscars--like Ryan Gosling, Amy Adams, and the Charlie Wilson's War component of Phillip Seymour Hoffman's championship year (the latter film, contrary to this correspondent's guess, is showing fresh legs beyond the holidays.)

If late Friday is the time to bury bad news, maybe Rosenberg was being kind to the also-disenfranchised Globes producer, Dick Clark Productions. Meanwhile, the AMPTP threw a crackback block in the late afternoon with the following brief release:

The WGA this morning engaged in a failed effort to stop the City of Los Angeles from issuing four separate permits for film production. Although the WGA was rebuffed by the L.A. Board of Public Works, the WGA's attempt to derail production on films with completed scripts -- and thus to throw hundreds and hundreds more people out of work -- shows that the WGA's organizers are continuing to do whatever they can to make good on their boast to "wreak havoc" on our industry.

The response from the WGA came much latr in the day:

The Board of Public Works approved the permits with the recommendation that the striking writers be given the opportunity to address the cast and crew of each film for 20 minutes to explain the issues in the strike. The WGA is committed to bringing this strike to a successful conclusion as quickly as possible. The big media companies that walked away from the bargaining table and continue to refuse to negotiate shoulder the responsibility for damaging the entertainment industry and the Los Angeles economy.

All in all, it appears we're headed for an even bumpier January than we thought.