Tom Hanks, like Richard Masur back in the day, wants Screen Actors Guild to awkwardly merge with AFTRA.

,http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/sag-election-video-support-by-tom-hanks-bill-macy-felicity-huffman-for-prez-candidate-ken-howard/

Richard Masur, when he was president of the Screen Actors Guild, was a tireless spokesperson for merging SAG with AFTRA (which handles both actors and radio/TV newspeople)--no matter how unwieldy and awkward the marriage would be.

Tom Hanks, who clearly cares a lot about his Playtone production company, is now espousing a SAG/AFTRA merger. With a merged SAG and AFTRA, it's safe to guess that AMPTP can demand more "reasonable" rates for hiring actors/background for filmed and videotaped "content."

If you're a SAG member, avoid voting for Unite4Strength unless you want to see your union become a pale whisper of what it began as in the 1930s.

Steven Spielberg needs more of the public's love--so he's remaking HARVEY.

The 1950 comedy/fantasy film HARVEY, from the Mary Chase play, isn't all that familiar to today's audiences (I don't think I've seen anything but clips). But it had James Stewart as a lovable alcohol-challenged man who alone saw a six-foot-tall rabbit named Harvey--and the film became a hit in its day.

Now Steven Spielberg plans to remake HARVEY for his next film as a director:
http://hollywood-elsewhere.com/2009/08/dusty_rabbit_ea.php
http://www.movieline.com/2009/08/is-there-any-actor-who-could-make-spielbergs-harvey-remake-interesting.php
And it's safe to conjecture that Elwood P. Dowd (the protagonist of HARVEY) will be sober.

Here's a spot-on quote from Jeffrey Wells' HOLLYWOOD ELSEWHERE column linked above:
"Spielberg almost always puts on the waders and sloshes right into the swamp. He's always looking to touch or melt hearts, even when the film would be better off without this. He'll never know from subtlety."

Nikki Finke on delay of SAG strike authorization vote.

Whether or not the Screen Actors Guild "vote yes for strike authorization re the AMPTP contract" contingent or the actor/producer contingent (including George Clooney, Tom Hanks and Danny DeVito--thinking more of their production deals than of rank-and-file actors) urging members to vote no (and wait three years for the next negotiating period) wins out is an open question at this time.

Here's Nikki Finke with her opinion of the delay in the strike authorization vote--and why she thinks it may be a good thing: http://www.deadlinehollywooddaily.com/dhd-to-sag-forget-strike-authorization-ballot-vote-on-contract-proposal/

Regardless of who wins or doesn't win the issue of the current SAG contract, the switch of TV episode reruns to websites (aka New Media) from over-the-airwaves broadcasts is a big deal and actors deserve proper residual compensation. To my mind, regardless of the AMPTP propaganda (sometimes transmitted by Patrick Goldstein of THE LOS ANGELES TIMES), it's a lot better that SAG and the producers get this worked out now than waiting another three years--when there will be other AMPTP-created reasons not to deal with the New Media issue.