Nanny star Fran Drescher has found herself criticized by many actors, writers and other members of the Hollywood film industry for her outing to Italy for a Dolce & Gabbana promotional event. Drescher, who was president of SAG-AFTRA, found himself involved in union negotiations with major studios after his weekend break.
SAG-AFTRA emphasized that during his visit to Italy, Drescher was still participating in negotiations. On Monday, an image of Drescher posing with Kim Kardashian appeared on Kardashian’s Instagram account. Some members of the SAG-AFTRA community left harsh reactions to Drescher’s involvement as the union and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers “face a midnight deadline PT July 12 to sign a new three-year contract,” and “ barring a deal, the union is expected to begin its first industrywide strike since 1980,” Variety reported.
In addition to his duties as president, Drescher also chairs SAG-AFTRA’s contract negotiations committee. As part of her responsibilities, she worked closely with Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, national executive director and chief negotiator for SAG-AFTRA.
On Monday, SAG-AFTRA released a statement supporting Drescher’s decision to attend the Dolce & Gabbana event as a “long-time ambassador” of the Italian luxury fashion line.
“Chairman Drescher is working as a brand ambassador for Dolce and Gabbana in Italy. This is a commitment well known to the negotiating committee. She negotiated daily in person or via video conference. President Drescher is managing a physically demanding schedule across three time zones, overseeing negotiations and working on site daily as well as managing the needs of her parents in [Florida] . She will return to the United States and will be in L.A. tomorrow [July 11], and will continue to chair our negotiations.”
It certainly doesn’t help that Hollywood creatives have been struggling since May’s writer’s strike, the first since 2007. The image of Drescher and Kardashian has made some insiders angry because Kardashian, a famous reality TV star, recently landed a role on FX’s American Horror Story, “and the show specifically That show has been on the radar of the WGA and SAG-AFTRA backers as it was one of the few shows still in production in recent weeks, after impressing WGA members in New York and Los Angeles has forced studios to close productions that have completed scripts to shoot. Featured writers did so by targeting sound fields and location shots with picket lines to prevent Teamsters and IATSE members from crossing them to get to work,” Variety elaborated.
Drescher’s journey to Italy also led management at the Hollywood negotiating table to point out that she was incapable of ‘reading the room’ as one might say. “How tone-deaf people can get,” said a senior executive at member studio AMPTP.
Kardashian seems pretty nonchalant about the whole thing, continuing to promote American Horror Story without much consideration for all the other TV shows that have collapsed under the pressure of the impromptu writer’s strike.
