娱乐英语新闻:Hollywood actors expected to ratify labor deal despite opposition

LOS ANGELES, April 20 (Xinhua) -- A labor agreement between Hollywood's largest actors union and major studios is expected to be approved despite the opposition from the union's outspoken leader, industry observers said Monday.

    Alan Rosenberg, president of the Screen Actors Guild, vowed to oppose ratification of the draft agreement narrowly approved through videoconferencing over the weekend by the union's divided board.

    The tentative agreement, covering actors in motion pictures and television, provides for a 3.5 percent annual increase, including a three-percent wage increase and a half-percent pension and health contribution increase upon ratification, and a 3.5 percent wage increase in the second year of the contract.

    SAG's 71-member national board approved the two-year agreement by a margin of 53 percent to 47 percent Sunday.

    The deal is largely the same as the last and final offer by Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which represents major Hollywood studios and television networks, observers said.

    The actors union rejected the offers late last year and tried to push for a better deal by threaten to launch an industry-wide strike.

    Sunday's vote means the SAG National Board will send the tentative agreement to the membership for ratification, with a recommendation from the board to vote "yes." The union has some 120,000 members mostly in Los Angeles and New York.

    Rosenberg, who lost control over the board majority earlier this year, voted against the contract himself. He said the pact doesn't guarantee SAG jurisdiction and residuals on some new-media projects.

    A major stumbling block during negotiations was the union's effort to receive better compensation for new media, including the Internet and other platforms, which the studios opposed because no one is making money through these new media.

    The proposed contract does not include residuals for shows created for the Internet.

    "This contract is anathema to everything we stand for," Rosenberg said, urging union members to vote against the deal in the referendum.

    To be ratified, the contract must be approved by a majority of SAG members in a vote that will occur in the next four to five weeks. Actors have been working without a contract since June 30, 2008, when the previous contract between SAG and AMPTP expired.

    The tentative agreement, which was announced Friday jointly by SAG and AMPTP, is likely to bring relief to many entertainment executives and local officials, who were fearful of a strike similar to the 14-week work stoppage by the Writers Guild of America starting in late 2007, which brought entertainment production to a halt and cost the Los Angeles area economy an estimated 3 billion dollars.