Former SAG-AFTRA president Melissa Gilbert has blasted a SAG-AFTRA message that urged its members not to dress up as characters from struck companies this Halloween.
SAG-AFTRA published a post on its website encouraging members to “celebrate Halloween this year while also staying in solidarity.” The guild recommended striking actors “choose costumes inspired by generalized characters and figures,” including a “ghost, zombie, spider, etc.,” or “characters from non-struck content, like an animated TV show.”
Gilbert was incensed at the suggestions.
“THIS is what you guys come up with? Literally no one cares what anyone wears for Halloween,” Gilbert wrote on Instagram. “I mean, do you really think this kind of infantile stuff is going to end the strike? We look like a joke. Please tell me you’re going to make this rule go away… and go negotiate!”
Gilbert directly tagged the Instagram accounts of current SAG-AFTRA president Fran Drescher and chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland.
“For the love of God, people are suffering mightily and this is what you have to say… c’mon guys… This is the kind of silly bullshit that keeps us on strike. ‘Let’s enact a policy that makes us look petty and incompetent at the same time.’”
Gilbert was in charge of the actors union from 2001 to 2005.