CHANNEL ISLAND
By
SCOTT COLLINS, CHANNEL ISLAND
June 23, 2008
To: Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger
Re: Screen Actors Guild talks
GOVERNOR, YOU were so inspiring when talking about the American dream back in
2004. Remember?
At the Republican convention, you told everyone what a
great place this country is. You reminisced about how when you immigrated here,
you heard a speech by Richard Nixon and it was "like a breath of fresh
air," a phrase not usually associated with our 37th president. You promised
that India and China would never surpass us because "America always moves
ahead."
Then came one of your best sound
bites: "To those critics who are so pessimistic about our economy, I
say: Don't be economic girlie men!"
There's no way you're an economic girlie man, Mr. Governor, and that's why we
hope you'll do something about the long-term economic pressures that are tilting
Hollywood to the precipice of another strike.
Now, look, your administration has many other problems; for instance, there's
that tiny matter of the state government being $15 billion in the hole and
running out of cash soon if a budget
isn't passed. Hey, sorry we brought it up!
But as a onetime box-office champ, it can't have escaped your notice that contract
talks between the Screen Actors Guild and the studios aren't going well.
Actors could walk off the job by the end of this month, and, in fact, the
business may already be suffering a "virtual strike," with production
of television series and films slowing to a trickle until the labor picture
resolves. The entertainment business, a strong driver of the Southern California
economy, is still recovering from the three-month writers strike that ended in
February. Many people believe the industry can't afford another work stoppage.
Certainly many of its ordinary workers can't.
People have seen "The Terminator" and your other movies, and maybe
they still dream you're an action hero in real life too. Maybe they think you
could barge into the negotiating room, smash the bargaining table with your bare
fists and snarl, "I'll be back."
That's not going to happen. We saw how you handled the writers strike, which was
something of a master class in political avoidance.
When the writers walked out, you initially said you couldn't get involved
because a federal mediator was on the case. Then, as if to tamp down allegations
of do-nothingism, you said you'd meet with officials from the Writers Guild and
the studios. You lamented the strike's economic damage. In the end, though, your
participation added up to not much. Your press secretary described your
involvement to us as "low-key."
It was, frankly, kind of a girlie man performance, Mr. Governor. But your
reluctance was understandable. Generally, politicians do themselves and their
constituents no favors by horning into the middle of nasty labor disputes.
And you may have even less reason to get involved in the actors' talks. It's
easy to see how your own membership in SAG could create awkward moments if you
tried to guide the union and studio leaderships to a deal. The moguls who
showered you with those multimillion paydays in the 1980s and '90s really didn't
want you around during the writers negotiations, so they certainly won't be
clamoring for you now.
Yet there is a big contribution you could make to stabilizing Hollywood's
future, something that could be part of your legacy. You could use your bully
pulpit to do something about the exodus of TV series and films to New York and
about 40 other states. That's the "runaway production" that continues
to send industry jobs elsewhere. Two recent examples: ABC's "Ugly
Betty" and "Life on Mars" decamped to New York in large part to
take advantage of tax incentives recently passed by that state. The laid-off
staffers at "Ugly Betty" even bought an ad in a trade paper begging
you to do something.
Of course, you don't need an ad to educate you about this issue. You already
know all about it. You've been talking about leveling the playing field for
California entertainment producers since you came to office in 2003.
And you're still talking. During a visit to Riverside this month, you said that
your friend Gov. Bill Richardson of New Mexico had ribbed you about how
"stupid" California was being for letting entertainment jobs slip
away. "We are losing billions of dollars in revenues because those
productions are all moving outside the state," you said.
Yet talk is, as they say, cheap, and we're no closer to any sort of economic
stimulus package today than in the past. That's not entirely your fault. Your
fellow Republicans, who usually cheer for anything that sounds like a tax cut,
have complained for years that entertainment tax incentives amount to handouts
for David Geffen and his pals.
And in August, this newspaper's editorial board argued that Hollywood tax
incentives would end up subsidizing productions that were never at risk of
leaving California in the first place. Using that logic, why not just solve the
current budget impasse by hiking taxes on every company doing business in the
state?
The problem is that runaway production is becoming an increasingly serious
competitive issue. People are losing their livelihoods because other states are
willing to do things their home state isn't.
You understand all that, and yet your leadership on this issue hasn't been very
muscular. You've let opportunities slip to take your case directly to the people
-- a tactic you employed often early in your administration.
Some say the clock's already run out. "The time to get this through was
during his first year in office," Dan Schnur, a former top aide to Gov.
Pete Wilson and Sen. John McCain who now teaches at Berkeley, told me. "In
his first year, he was a governor in the middle of a honeymoon. Now, he's a
fifth-year governor in the middle of a $15-billion budget deficit . . . . It's
impossible."
To your credit, you haven't given up. Your office says your budget proposal is
going to include an economic stimulus package for California film and TV
production, although the details are "up in the air," according to
your spokesman Aaron McLear.
That's all well and good, but the entertainment industry, already battered by
the forces of globalization and technology as well as years of dubious
investment decisions by the studios, may need a bit more than just a
"trailer bill" on the back of an already troubled budget. You need to
get out there and argue your case.
Let's think of this in bodybuilding terms. The entertainment industry, where you
made your personal fortune, has lost a lot of muscle. It needs help packing some
meat on those biceps and quads. It needs a motivator like you to avoid a girlie
man fate.
Don't you want to pump it up?