TCA Press Tour: a brief encounter with Corbin Bernsen

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We sat next to Corbin Bernsen -- late of ‘L.A. Law,’ currently of ‘Psych’ and here at Press Tour because of Hallmark Channel’s aforementioned ‘For the Love of Grace’ -- at lunch.

He had some things to say about the possibility of an actors strike. Bernsen was a member of the group, he said, that had tried and failed to limit which members can vote to authorize a strike. He thinks that if you don’t work regularly, you shouldn’t be able to vote -- he noted that he himself, a former member of the Writers Guild, was disqualified from that union at a certain point because he had not made enough money as a writer recently. Bernsen agrees with that philosophy.

He also said that he doesn’t believe in residuals, which is a key issue for the above-the-line unions. He thinks that if you work and get paid well, it doesn’t matter that they rebroadcast it -- why should you make more? (Not that he minds his own residuals, as long as they’re around, he said.) He referred to himself as ‘socialistic,’ and thinks that the people who work on sets who don’t receive residual payments are much more key to the production than actors, directors and the writers who do.

We asked whether he had discussed these views with Alan Rosenberg, the president of the Screen Actors Guild, and his fellow ‘L.A. Law’ co-star. We were being somewhat facetious, but Bernsen said that he had tried, in fact, to call Rosenberg, but didn’t hear back from him.

-- Kate Aurthur