Key Differences
While for decades the two unions have worked together, there are some key differences between SAG and AFTRA, both in the way the unions are governed and in the way they approach organizing. These differences have led to relatively recent allegations by the Membership First faction, which controls SAG’s Hollywood Division Leadership against AFTRA, and to counter-charges by AFTRA against SAG and its NED.
We offer the following summary of the key differences. We recognize that our definition of “key” may not match yours, and that there may be other differences that could be included on this list. We’ll add to them as necessary. At the bottom of this page are links to the unions’ own explanations of the issues - caution: these links take you to places where our no spin guarantee does not apply!
WHAT’S THE CONTROVERSY?
SAG’s Membership First faction has raised several complaints about AFTRA. AFTRA has rejected the complaints as baseless.
The Poaching Claim
Ever since shortly after SAG was founded in 1933 and AFTRA was founded, as AFRA, in 1937 the jurisdictional lines between the unions have been cause for conflict. The lines have often been blurry, and as far back as the late 1930s there were calls for merger.
The first merger plan failed in 1940 when a prominent Congressman alleged it was part of a communist conspiracy. According to the SAG official history, in 1940, the three principal unions in the field, SAG, AFRA and Actors Equity agreed that there would be joint jurisdiction. Ever since there have been battles between the unions, and recently the Membership First faction of SAG has made alleged “poaching” of SAG’s jurisdiction part of its battle cry.
Is Membership First right? To decide, you need to learn some history.
In 1952, SAG won what seemed like a victory in an early skirmish with AFTRA, when the Associated Actors & Artistes of America, (the 4As) resolved that SAG would have jurisdiction “over all actors (including singers, announcers, stunt men, and airplane pilots) employed in the motion picture field including, without limitation, all motion pictures produced for use over television; also over all extras employed in such motion picture field in the state of New York.” AFTRA would have jurisdiction, according to the 4As resolution, over television “done in the live manner.” It is this 1952 resolution that Membership First claims still applies today.
However, according to SAG’s website, the 1952 attempt at resolution of the jurisdictional issues really lasted for about four years. Technology changed everything, as film began to be replaced by videotape. By 1958 the jurisdictional fighting was sufficient to bring the dispute for arbiration at the National Labor Relations Board, which, back then, was an agency that actually supported labor organizations.
AFTRA has a different take on this. It views the 1952 “in the live manner” document as having given SAG jurisdiction over CBS, which was the only network using film at the time, and giving AFTRA jurisdiction over everything else, which was either live or done on the videotape of its time, the kinescope. And it suggests there has never been a full resolution of that dispute. In any event, for the next 20 years, the unions lived uneasily with each other, as the business grew up around them. The disputes didn’t go away, and neither did the thought of merger. In 1978, as SAG and AFTRA jointly went on strike for higher pay in the commercials field, meetings began on a new merger concept.
The result wasn’t merger. But it was two critically important agreements, each with an eye towards merger of SAG and AFTRA.
The best known of the agreements is a 1981 contract known as Phase 1 to Merger, covered joint negotiation of major contracts. The other, dealing with jurisdictional disputes in the interim, was an agreement known as the Situs Agreement. The Situs Agreement gave SAG jurisdiction over any filmed production, regardless of its distribution, that was done on one of the traditional movie lots.
The Situs Agreement was the rule by which the unions co-existed peacefully, as long as the bulk of the production was done on film, and on the major lots. SAG, because of the Situs Agreement, ruled the roost in primetime, and AFTRA did nothing to change the status quo. Then technology changed again, and the peace in the valley vanished along with the film cameras.
At the time of the Situs Agreement, no one had anticipated digital. No one had provided for new technology of any kind - the unions had simply assumed that film would be here forever. Ooops.
An interesting account of this history, from SAG’s Chicago Branch President and National Board member Todd Hissong is at http://sagfirebird.blogspot.com/- look for the November 20, 2007 post.
One of the most inflammatory comments made recently came from SAG NED Doug Allen, who told members at the SAG New York Membership Meeting that “AFTRA has to stop feeding on the backs of actors.” Since AFTRA is an actors union and has been one for decades, by any standard the comment appears to be nothing more than excessive rhetoric.
Allen’s comment has led to a substantial backlash against SAG and renewed sharp criticism of the embattled Allen, who, at the same meeting, angrily defended his failure to reveal that he’d crossed his own union’s picket lines to play football as a strikebreaker during the 1974 NFL Players Strike. That strike collapsed soon after Allen and others failed to support their union.
The Undercutting Claim
In the area of cable television organizing, particularly related to scripted dramatic programs, a sharp dispute has arisen between SAG and AFTRA. One neutral observer, Santa Clara Law School Associate Professor Stephen P. Diamond, defined the dispute this way: “In one corner is the Membership First party of the Screen Actors, which argues that AFTRA offers broadcasters cut rate contracts that undercut rates long established by the larger Actors Guild. AFTRA, on the other hand, argues that its contracts are more flexible and in tune with emerging production structures.” Who’s right?Ignoring, for the moment, the curious and unexplained emphasis by Membership First on “scripted dramatic” programming as opposed to any other form, the facts seem to be these: 1. SAG has only one basic cable pattern contract. The full agreement does not appear to be available on the SAG website.
2. AFTRA has four basic cable pattern contracts, which the union says it makes available to producers dependening upon the size of the production budget. These agreements do not appear to be available on the AFTRA website.
3. AFTRA will negotiate and has negotiated what it terms “initial” deals on productions which contain rates lower than the SAG basic cable pattern contract. AFTRA says it makes ”initial” deals in order to reduce the number of productions that have fled to production centers outside the United States, and that its other templates may result in payments to actors that are higher than the SAG basic cable pattern rates.
4. Membership First and SAG NED Doug Allen have complained that the AFTRA initial deals amount to undercutting SAG’s rates in order to obtain market share, a complaint AFTRA rejects. SAG’s position is that Global Rule 1, which bars members from working in non union productions, is a sufficient organizing tool to bring new productions into the union fold. AFTRA calls that claim a hoax, noting that almost half of the shows SAG asserts are signed to its basic cable contract are produced outside the United States, with casts made up almost entirely of non union actors, salted with one to three SAG members as visiting stars, while almost all of AFTRA’s shows are produced in the United States, with U.S.actors getting all the jobs.
5. Some AFTRA leaders call the undercutting claim disingenous. They note that SAG achieved its dominance in television and commercials in the pre-Phase 1 period by undercutting AFTRA in order to win jurisdiction. This technique was quite successful, but came at a tremendous cost to actors, as SAG gave up per run residuals on television commercials, full coverage for background performers and agreed to pay commission on scale - all giveaways of AFTRA-won contract terms. The result was that producers in the early 1980s and 90s shifted production from AFTRA to SAG contracts, simply because they were cheaper.
WHO HAS THE SHOWS NOW
The current statistics were published on a number of websites in a post by an AFTRA Board member - so we can’t vouch for them. But they apparently come from inside AFTRA. Below is a cut and paste of one of those posts.One hour shows AFTRA 67% in the USA vs. 50% for SAG. 1/2 hour shows AFTRA 94% in the USA vs 100% (1 show) for SAG: Total: 88% US production under AFTRA, 54% US production under SAG. Of the AFTRA shows (both 1/2 hour and 1 hour combined) that were shot outside the US, half used the per run residuals, half used exhibition window formulae.
Membership First makes the point that the current statistics are quite different than those of just a few years ago. Back then, SAG had far more shows than AFTRA. Membership First has accused AFTRA of both poaching and undercutting, and says that’s the reason SAG has lost ground. AFTRA says its digital organizing campaign laid the groundwork for its resurgence in primetime…and that digital production is not exclusively within either union’s jurisdiction, except for productions made for theatrical release, which, at the moment, AFTRA has not attempted to organize, and which, it says, it refers to SAG.
Proportionality
SAG’s most recent official statement on the cable TV potion of the dispute is here.
One actor, Ed Fry, who is affiliated with the New York based group AFTRA Now, recently summed up his view of the controversy this way, and we like his description: “SAG sticks to the highest rates in cable, even if it results in half their shows being overwhelmingly populated by non SAG actors; SAG sticks to higher rates for background, even if it means fewer jobs; SAG sticks to higher qualification rates in P&H, even if it means lower participation; SAG is a closed union, even if it means growing more non-union competition. AFTRA negotiates a variety of terms, especially if it means there are more jobs as a result; AFTRA will take lower rates in BG if it means more jobs for more people; AFTRA has lower qualification rates in H&R to get more people some coverage; AFTRA is an open union, combating the spread of non-union competition.”