Stephen Amell says dozens of actors texted him in support of his criticism against the SAG-AFTRA strike.
The Heels and Arrow actor, who said he didn’t support his union’s “myopic” strike before attempting to walk back his comments, appeared on TMZ Live on Tuesday to discuss the controversy. He said that while he supports SAG, he doesn’t support the decision to strike. Heels, his Starz show premiered its second season on Friday, and he hasn’t been able to promote the show, per the union’s strike orders.
“I understand the strike on an intellectual level,” Amell told the outlet. However, “striking is not the only form of negotiating.” He hopes by speaking out it will “encourage people to get back to the table and negotiate.”
To that end, he said he was meeting with SAG leadership “to show them how much I support them and want to stand with them. But just because I agree with…” he trailed off before saying: “I love my co-workers, I love my wife and I love my kids very much. That doesn’t mean that I always agree with the choices that they make, but I will never, ever leave them in a time of need — and I won’t do that to my union.”
Asked if other actors have contacted him to express shared opinions, he replied, “I’ve gotten an extreme amount of support… I woke up this morning to 60 plus text messages… I’m not going to say who they are… And they support the union too.”
Amell criticized the blowback, saying, “We live in a time right now — and I don’t I don’t want to wax too poetic here — where people want you to vote as long as you’re voting for their candidate.”
He continued, “I think [the contract negotiation with Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers] has been done in a very black and white, all or nothing way.” And he doesn’t think enough “consideration” has been given to the projects coming out since the strike started — like Heels, his wrestling drama — which “I and a bunch of other people pour their heart and soul into.”
However, he acknowledges “that’s something that, retrospectively, I should have done a better job of taking up in private with the leadership of my union.”
It’s unclear what came out of his meeting with SAG leaders. Yahoo has reached out to reps for Amell and SAG.
Over the weekend, Amell attended Raleigh’s GalaxyCon and expressed his frustration over the strike. He told the crowd, “I support my union, I do, and I stand with them. I do not support striking. I don’t.” He called it a “reductive negotiating tactic” and “myopic.”
Amell, one of the first actors to criticize the strike, which SAG president Fran Drescher said could last for six months, tried to clarify his comments in an Instagram post. “My support is unconditional and I stand with them,” he wrote, but said the strike is “emotionally frustrating on many levels.” He ended by saying, “at least for the foreseeable future, I choose to stand with my union” and asked those who may seem him on a picket line to not “whip any hard fruit” at him.
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