SAG-AFTRA Factions Form Unity Slate To Reelect President Fran Drescher & Secretary-Treasurer Joely Fisher In Rare Show Of Solidarity

Ukrainian filmmaker Oleg Sentsov has sustained shrapnel injuries while fighting in the Zaporizhzhia region in southeastern Ukraine.

Blur’s Dave Rowntree has shared his opinion of Labour leader Keir Starmer in a new interview with NME.The Britpop veteran was taking part in the latest installation of NME’s Does Rock N’ Roll Kill Braincells?! series when he was asked to recall key moments from throughout his career, including his work in politics.Alongside his role as the drummer for Blur, Rowntree has also had a successful career in politics throughout much of the 21st Century – even going as far as to be elected as a Labour Councillor in Norfolk in 2017.Now, following his time in the role, which came to an end in 2021, the musician revealed his thoughts on current Labour leader, Keir Starmer.“Well, the test is at General Elections,” he began, discussing how well he thinks the figurehead is faring with the public. “If he wins the General Election, he’ll be widely touted as the most visionary Labour leader of modern times and will join the incredibly small number of Labour leaders who’ve gone on to become prime minister.”“If he loses, he’ll be regarded as an idiot who wrecked the Labour Party and achieved nothing,” he continued.

This Morning viewers found themselves distracted when tuning into the latest episode of the show before one particular segment left them feeling 'sick'. The ITV daytime show returned for another week on Monday with Alison Hammond and Dermot O'Leary at the helm.

Sir Rod Stewart is known for being a big family man and fans were loving a new clip posted by his daughter-in-law Nicole of the rocker dancing with his two children Liam and Ruby and their new babies.

South Park characters would look like in real life.The results, which you can see below, show what the core foursome of Stan, Kyle, Eric and Kenny would look like. Other characters include Butters, Mr Garrison and Chef.Fans appear to be impressed by the imagined live action depictions of characters from the animated comedy series.“Holy fuck these are perfect,” wrote one person, while another said: “I would pay good money for this to be reality.”A post shared by @manmeetsmachineOthers pointed to the rendering of Kanye West, who featured in a 2009 episode called Fishsticks – although that image is understandably easier to craft.

Sabbatical Entertainment Sets Distribution Partnership With V Channels Media

EXCLUSIVE: A24 has quietly added another experienced exec to its steadily growing London office.

Hollyoaks star Lucy-Jo Hudson has opened up to fans about the challenges of having a child with an allergy as she recalled the moment her son passed out and 'stopped breathing' when he was just 18 months old.

Heineken UK is to invest £25m in its landmark brewery in Manchester in a major project to reduce its carbon emissions.

If you’re jetting off on holiday it’s important to keep updated on the status of your flight. Cancellations or delays can occur at the last minute, impacting scheduled departures.

Stacey Solomon jokingly told her fans that she and her husband Joe Swash may not make it to their first wedding anniversary later this month as they were seen bickering at home following their reunion after days apart.

A supermarket has splashed the price of 500 key 'weekly shop' products in a bid to help families through the cost of living crisis.

Former Gogglebox star Scarlett Moffatt recently gave birth to her first child - and she's been keeping people updated about their progress. Scarlett, a past winner of I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here, welcomed the new arrival five weeks early, she announced last month.

Naman Ramachandran Music tourism spending in the U.K. in 2022 was £6.6 billion ($8.6 billion), a report from industry body U.K. Music has revealed. In 2022 – the first full year of post-pandemic festivals, gigs and concerts in the U.K. – music tourists were lured by the return of major events such as Glastonbury, where headliners included Paul McCartney, and U.K. tours by top British artists, including Dua Lipa, Stormzy, Harry Styles, Ed Sheeran and Elton John, the report said. The key findings of U.K. Music’s 2022 “Here, There and Everywhere” report include: total number of music tourists attending live music events across the U.K. in 2022 was 14.4 million; total number of international music tourists in 2022 was 1.1 million; total number of domestic music tourists in 2022 was 13.3 million; and total employment sustained by music tourism in 2022 was 56,000.

Naman Ramachandran India’s media and entertainment industry is expected to reach $73.6 billion by 2027 with a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 9.48%, says consultancy firm PwC’s “Global Entertainment & Media Outlook 2023-2027” report. In terms of growth percentage, streaming leads the way with revenue surging 25% in 2022 to reach $1.8 billion. The market will continue to grow at 14% CAGR to produce revenue of $3.5 billion in 2027. This will be driven by the competitive SVOD sector, which accounted for 78% of sector revenue in 2022, the report says, adding that while subscription service revenues will expand at 13% CAGR to reach $2.6 billion, ad-supported services (AVOD) will grow at a higher rate, albeit from a lower base.

Manchester United have embarked on a packed pre-season schedule - with a relentless tour itinerary having previously been cited as a reason behind poor starts to the Premier League campaign.

A new drug has been hailed as a "turning point in the fight against Alzheimer’s" after it was found to slow the progression of the disease.

Oprah Winfrey has a very tight-knit inner circle and she previously said that she only has a few close friends.

Jim Caviezel stars in the new movie Sound of Freedom, which has been a surprise mega-hit at the box office this summer.

Britney Spears appears to be making a musical comeback, and we want to know who you think she should work with next.

Jamie Lee Curtis‘ family is increasing with the birth of her “movie daughter” Lindsay Lohan‘s son Luai.

Patrick Frater Asia Bureau Chief Movie stars Zhou Xun and Jelly Lin head the cast of “Imperfect Victim,” a new mainland Chinese drama series that focuses on workplace sexual harassment and leads to a rape trial. Zhou (“Cloud Atlas,” “The Silent War,” “Painted Skin”) plays a lawyer who steps in to represent the character played by Lin (“The Mermaid”), who alleges assault by her boss at work. He is portrayed by TV veteran Liu Yijun (“Nirvana in Fire,” “The Pretender”). The case becomes complicated and Zhou’s character is forced to question her own ethics. The show is highly topical, given the slowly building #MeToo movement in China. This is being fuelled by numerous instances of sexual discrimination, sexual assault and outright violence towards women, many instances of which have gone viral on Chinese social media before being deleted by censors.

Black Sabbath bassist Geezer Butler has recalled the time that his bandmate Tony Iommi was nearly “sacrificed” onstage by a “lunatic”.Speaking to Reader’s Digest, Butler reflected on growing up in a strict Catholic home, the band’s “satanic” imagery and how that resulted in several weird experiences for the metal pioneers.“My dad wasn’t very pleased when he saw the inverted cross on the sleeve of our first album. But, generally, nobody in the UK or Europe cared that much about our Satanic imagery,” Butler shared.He went on to explain: “In the US, though, people would threaten us and turn up at our gigs with crosses and bibles. In Nashville, someone jumped on stage and went for Tony with a knife.

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer SAG-AFTRA and the studios will keep talking beyond the midnight Friday contract deadline, as they remain at odds on issues like streaming residuals and artificial intelligence. The union has agreed to extend the contract to July 12. The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and SAG-AFTRA made the announcement in a joint statement just before 7 p.m. Friday. In a message to its membership, SAG-AFTRA said the leadership had decided unanimously to extend the contract “in order to exhaust every opportunity to achieve the righteous contract we all demand and deserve.”

SAG-AFTRA’s negotiations for a new contract are making headway “in some areas” but not in others, Fran Drescher, the guild’s president, said in an interview today on ABC’s Good Morning America.  

EXCLUSIVE: With 54 hours to go before SAG-AFTRA’s current contract with the studios expires on June 30, both sides are considering extending their negotiations until next week or slightly later.

be joining Hollywood writers on the picket lines.The Screen Actors Guild (SAG) and American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (AFTRA), which represent the majority of actors in film and television, are in negotiations with major Hollywood studios, who are being represented by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), for a new contract agreement after the current deal expires June 30 at midnight Pacific Time.Among the actors' sticking points for a new agreement are improved compensation and benefits, residuals that reflect the value of their contributions amid the expansion of streaming services, regulated use of artificial intelligence and the issue of self-taped auditions.On June 24, SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher and national executive director/chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland updated members of the union on ongoing talks with studios. Drescher shared in a video message that negotiations have been «extremely productive» and that «we're going to achieve a seminal deal.»A few days later, more than 300 actors — including Meryl Streep and Jennifer Lawrence — signed a letter urging leaders not to compromise and writing «SAG-AFTRA members may be ready to make sacrifices that leadership is not.»«Anyone right now is trying to guess what could happen,» Marc Malkin, 's senior culture & events editor, told ET.

EXCLUSIVE: After it emerged that over 300 actors had written to SAG-AFTRA leadership that they are “prepared to strike” if the guild doesn’t “get all the way there” during talks with the studios, the number of actors signing the letter has more than tripled overnight.

, more than 300 members of the Screen Actors Guild, including Meryl Streep and Jennifer Lawrence, are threatening to strike should an agreement on a new contract with major Hollywood studios, streamers, and production companies not be reached.The letter, addressed to the SAG-AFTRA Leadership and Negotiating Committee was allegedly sent to leadership expressing their concern with the idea that «SAG-AFTRA members may be ready to make sacrifices that leadership is not.»«We hope you’ve heard the message from us: This is an unprecedented inflection point in our industry, and what might be considered a good deal in any other years is simply not enough,» the letter, obtained by , says. «We feel that our wages, our craft, our creative freedom, and the power of our union have all been undermined in the last decade.

, more than 300 members of the Screen Actors Guild, including Meryl Streep and Jennifer Lawrence, are threatening to strike should an agreement on a new contract with major Hollywood studios, streamers, and production companies not be reached.The letter, addressed to the SAG-AFTRA Leadership and Negotiating Committee was allegedly sent to leadership expressing their concern with the idea that «SAG-AFTRA members may be ready to make sacrifices that leadership is not.»«We hope you’ve heard the message from us: This is an unprecedented inflection point in our industry, and what might be considered a good deal in any other years is simply not enough,» the letter, obtained by , says. «We feel that our wages, our craft, our creative freedom, and the power of our union have all been undermined in the last decade.

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer A group of more than 400 actors — including Oscar winners Meryl Streep, Jennifer Lawrence and Rami Malek — are urging SAG-AFTRA leaders to take a harder line as contract talks reach a critical point. The members sent an internal letter Tuesday to the union’s negotiating committee and the leadership. They emphasized that “we are prepared to strike if it comes to that.” “And we are concerned by the idea that SAG-AFTRA members may be ready to make sacrifices that leadership is not,” they continued. The contract expires on Friday, and the leadership has the power to call a strike as soon as Saturday if no agreement is reached.

Manori Ravindran Executive Editor of International If you ask most people in the U.K. industry how business is going right now, they’ll likely tell you it’s been agonizingly “slow.” It’s meant to be boom time for production, but this summer, the U.S. writers strike combined with a cost of living crisis is brutally squeezing unscripted and scripted projects. This week, as the clock ticks away on negotiations between American actors union SAG-AFTRA and Hollywood’s collective bargaining agent, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, the prevailing thought will be: is all of this about to get much worse? A number of British actors Variety has spoken to say they’ve yet to hear from local actors’ union Equity with any guidance about their situation. That’s likely because it’s being worked out in real time. Paul W. Fleming, general secretary for Equity, has been in Los Angeles for discussions with SAG-AFTRA, which is optimistic about its negotiations with the AMPTP. (He’s also visiting New York to meet with theater union Actors’ Equity.)

SAG-AFTRA leaders painted a sunny picture of their ongoing negotiations in a video released over the weekend, saying the talks have been “extremely productive” and promising to reach a “seminal deal.” But according to multiple sources with knowledge of the dynamic in the negotiating room, the sides remain far apart on a range of key issues. With just a few days left before SAG-AFTRA’s current contract expires on Friday, some are privately predicting that talks will be extended beyond the June 30 deadline, though such a move has not formally been broached in the negotiating room with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

In an unprecedented show of solidarity, SAG-AFTRA’s two leading political factions have joined forces to form a unity slate to endorse the reelection of president Fran Drescher and secretary-treasurer Joely Fisher in an election will be held later this summer.

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer With less than a week to go before their contract expires, the leaders of SAG-AFTRA are striking an optimistic note about the progress of negotiations. In a video sent to members on Saturday, union president Fran Drescher and chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland say they hope to be able to achieve a deal with the studios. If they do, that would avert a “double strike,” in which performers would join the Writers Guild of America on picket lines outside the major studios. “I just want to assure you that we are having an extremely productive negotiations that are laser-focused on all of the crucial issues you told us are most important to you,” Drescher said. “We’re standing strong and we’re going to achieve a seminal deal.”

SAG-AFTRA leaders told their members today that the guild’s ongoing contract negotiations have been “extremely productive” and that they “remain optimistic” that a fair deal can be reached with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.