Producers Hold to Terms of Defeated Pact

In a highly unusual move, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers informed the Screen Extras Guild on Thursday that it will unilaterally implement a concessionary contract on Dec. 28 because “further bargaining would be futile.”

An industry source said the alliance informed the guild at a meeting called by a representative of the Federal Mediation and Conciliation Service.

The guild announced Monday that its members had voted down the proposed contract by a margin of 90% to 10% in a mail ballot.

Extras--people who fill out crowd scenes in movie and television shows--are paid $91 a day. That will be reduced to $68 for eight hours and $54 for six hours when the alliance implements its proposal.

Double-time pay on weekends will be eliminated and extras will have to work more hours to qualify for overtime. The alliance will also reduce the minimum number of guild members who must be hired as extras before non-union extras can be used.

‘Unprecedented’ Move

Robert Gilbert, a Beverly Hills attorney who has occasionally advised the guild, said the alliance’s action in unilaterally implementing a contract is “unprecedented” in Hollywood labor relations.

At Thursday’s meeting, J. Nicholas Counter III, president of the alliance, gave H. O’Neil Shanks, national executive secretary of the guild, a letter explaining the alliance’s position. A copy of the letter was read to The Times by an industry source.

The letter reiterated the alliance’s position that its member companies--major Hollywood studios like Disney, 20th Century Fox, Universal and Warner Bros.--need concessions because they “are at a severe competitive disadvantage with respect to the employment of extras.” This was a reference to non-union film companies frequently employing extras for $35 a day.

The letter, signed by Counter, said the guild’s negotiating committee had tentatively agreed to accept the concessions contract in October, saying it would recommend the pact to the guild’s 6,700 members. A series of protests in the guild caused the union leadership to reverse itself and recommend that the contract be voted down.

Guild members who had urged rejection of the pact said it would destroy the extras’ standard of living. They maintain that if the contract were rejected, the alliance would come up with a better offer. That did not happen.

“Your present negotiating committee informed us today,” Counter’s letter to Shanks noted, “that anything less than present contract terms and conditions is totally unacceptable. . . . In light of your position, as stated this date, further bargaining would be futile.”

10 Days’ Notice

The alliance will implement its new proposal in 10 days, as specified in the old contract, which expired earlier this year. That pact had been extended until Thursday.

The Times was unable to reach Shanks or any other guild official for immediate comment. The guild could strike beginning Dec. 28, when the alliance proposal is implemented.

In initially recommending that guild members accept the contract, the guild leader said such a strike would be unwinnable.