Historic Hollywood strike reaches tentative end

Rebecca Olds
·2 min read
Striking writers and actors chant as they walk a picket line outside the Warner Bros. Discovery officers, Monday, July 17, 2023, in New York. Nearly four months later, a tentative agreement has been met between the SAG-AFTRA and Hollywood studios on Nov. 8, 2023.
Striking writers and actors chant as they walk a picket line outside the Warner Bros. Discovery officers, Monday, July 17, 2023, in New York. Nearly four months later, a tentative agreement has been met between the SAG-AFTRA and Hollywood studios on Nov. 8, 2023. | John Minchillo, Associated Press

After 118 days, a tentative agreement was reached between Hollywood’s actors union and production studios on Wednesday evening, potentially ending the longest actors’ strike in history.

Members of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Performers, numbering about 60,000, will still need to ratify the new negotiations and three-year contract in the coming days, per The Associated Press.

“I’m relieved,” Kevin Zegers, an actor most recently seen in the ABC show “The Rookie: Feds,” told The New York Times following the announcement. “If it didn’t end today, there would have been riots.”

Terms of the contract were not immediately released, but SAG-AFTRA board members will review the contract during a meeting on Friday and give more details afterward, per the Times.

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Are actors still on strike in Hollywood?

With the tentative deal made on Wednesday, the strike is at a standstill until union members ratify the negotiations, as reported by AP. The strike will officially be called off on Nov. 9 at 12:01 a.m.

The writers strike ended on Sept. 27 after an agreement was reached.

Why were Hollywood actors on strike?

The union originally joined the screenwriters who had already gone on strike in May over concerns about the usage of artificial intelligence and streaming service pay, reported The New York Times.

How long was the actors' strike?

The strike, which began on July 14, lasted for nearly four months, making it one of the longest-running labor crises in history, per the Times. The heavy financial toll has been felt on both sides.

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