BANFF, Alta. - Actor Alec Baldwin says his latest trip to Canada shows exactly why the writers guild needs to ends its strike and follow "right behind'' a tentative deal between major film and TV studios and the directors union.
"I came up here and for the first time I gave a guy $100 American and he gave me back 96 Canadian dollars,'' he said. "America's not in good shape right now.''
Baldwin said he remains "totally supportive'' of what the writers have been seeking in their 10-week-long strike that's stopped most new episodes of television's most popular programs.
But he believes that the timing is wrong with the U.S. still mired in a costly war in Iraq and teetering on the edge of a recession.
Baldwin, who has played dozens of hard-nosed movie roles over the last 20 years, is one of the best-known actors attending this weekend's Waterkeeper Alliance fundraiser hosted by Robert Kennedy Jr. in the Canadian Rocky Mountain resort town of Banff, Alta.
"I'm not against strikes, but I'm against strikes when we're in a time of war. People pretend they're not, but we're at war in my country.''
Baldwin says it's past the time for picking sides or laying blame in the strike. "People need to regroup and decide that it's probably in everybody's interest if we go back to work soon.''
The labour dispute between writers and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has dragged out since Nov. 5, primarily over the writers' shares of potential profits from Internet programming and other new media.
Mainly played out below the radar, the strike has begun to garner more attention as many of television's most popular shows such as "Desperate Housewives,'' "Grey's Anatomy'' and "CSI: Crime Scene Investigation'' have run out of new episodes.
Last week's Golden Globe awards were stripped of their star power and turned into an anticlimactic press conference when actors refused to cross threatened picket lines.
The hand-wringing and teeth-gnashing has already started over fears the same fate could befall the Oscars. Hollywood's biggest bash of the year looms little more than a month away on Feb. 24.
While the studios and the writers stopped bargaining in early December, the union representing Hollywood directors hatched a tentative deal Thursday after less than a week at the table.
The directors guild called the deal "groundbreaking and substantial,'' and made headway where the writers could not, including a three-year agreement that sets up key provisions to compensate directors for programs available on the Internet.
The writers guild, which had previously stated that the directors did not represent its members' interests, said it would evaluate the terms of Thursday's deal.
Other actors who attended a Thursday night cocktail party in Banff also said they hoped the directors' deal meant an end to the writers strike was near at hand.
"I hope that's good news -- that's heading in a positive direction,'' said Dennis Franz, best known for his marathon role as gritty cop Andy Sipowicz on "NYPD Blue.''
"It's the guys on the crews that have to come in on a daily basis, and they go from day to day -- they're the ones that this has done a great deal of damage to, and it's been very hard on them.''
Actor and director Chad Lowe, brother of actor Rob Lowe, said he hoped both the writers and producers would see the directors' deal as a potential solution.
"I think it gives both sides an opportunity to save face.''
And Lowe said he hoped it would also form the basis of a new deal for the Screen Actors Guild and avoid another labour dispute when that contract expires in June.
"I don't know if anybody's going to have the stomach for a fight anymore after this, not for a little bit,'' he said.
"And I think after three years, we can revisit the issues. We'll have a lot more information on the table.''
