Hollywood Writers go on STRIKE

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All right, everybody break out the world’s smallest violin. The Screen Actors Guild, the actors and actresses have gone on strike. The humanity! Anyway, if you get a chance, go and watch Fran Drescher. She’s in charge of the SAG union and this rant that she goes on yesterday. The only thing that came into mind was, and the Oscar goes to…

Fran Drescher! It was her best acting performance she’s had in her entire career. I mean, I saw a few episodes of The Nanny way back when. It was funny. And I actually thought about it a little bit. That I actually looked it up. I had to look up the guy. I knew that she was in Saturday Night Fever. Remember that? I liked that movie way back when. She was also, Cadillac Man too. She was good in Cadillac Man. I can’t think of any other movies that she was in, but.

Maybe later we’ll share with you that scene that I got a kick out of from Saturday Night Beaver. Anyway, Fran Drescher going off on this mega rant. Oh my God. And she brought in things like the average American has $500 in their savings account and all these companies care about is Wall Street.

But this is the liberal mindset. They really don’t understand how the world works. They really don’t. And again, you can act up there and you can yell and scream and do all of these things. Do you think this is going to resonate with most Americans? I mean, we know how much money you guys make. God bless you. I don’t care.

I don’t care, God bless you. But don’t start getting into how the world works in capitalism. She doesn’t, she was actually talking about how the business model has changed. Oh shit, Sherlock, have you seen the stock prices of all of these major studios? They’re in the tank. Disney is doing everything and anything it can to unload its television properties. We’ve talked about this here on the program.

It’s not the same anymore. And how slow everybody was to react to this was extraordinary. Now, none of you actors and actresses gave a damn when Netflix first came out and started their studio and started throwing money at you left, right, and all over the place. You were happy to take it. But again, with all of the cord cutting that’s been going on, people changing, shorter series, you’re not having these

these series that last for years and years and years with residuals, the markets changed for everyone. And I’ve explained this before. I want everybody to kind of pay attention to this. Now, you’re an advertiser, right? You wanna advertise. You make a high-end product. I’m gonna pick a company. I’m gonna pick Mercedes-Benz. Mercedes-Benz, you used to go out and you used to buy advertisements on television shows. You buy them on television shows that you thought might fit your demographic.

Okay, people watching this show might be apt to buy your product. What if there’s no commercials anymore? Or better yet, they have commercials, but you can pay not to watch the commercials. You’re making a high-end product. Most people that are gonna buy that high-end product are probably gonna pay a little bit extra not to watch the commercial. So they have to do things via product placement as best they can. And I spot it.

Okay, a mile away is a great television show on Hulu that I love, it’s called The Bear. And you’ll see that Stella Artois is definitely, definitely kicking money into that show. You’ll see a billboard in the back and when they’re kicking back, the restaurant workers are kicking back and having a beer, it’s definitely a Stella. So again, you can do things via product placement. I remember it was one of the James Bond’s, they was drinking a Heineken.

doesn’t usually happen, but again, Heineken paid to have that happen. Automakers will do it. I’m curious to see what cars are gonna be featured in the new Mission Impossible film. I got a sink in suspicion that they paid to have those cars featured in that. Again, watch Fox News. Watch Fox and Friends in the morning. You know when they have all those happy, joy, joy.

segments outside and I got the barbecue guy here. The other day they had a tiny house thing on. I walked by the television, my wife’s watching. I was like, they’re doing what? You do realize people that these are not stories that their journalists went out and got. They’re commercials. They’re commercials that are baked into the show. It’s an entire segment. And all it is one big fat commercial. Most people don’t even realize it when they’re watching it. And that’s part of the gig.

but it’s much, much more difficult. Now, in every way, shape, manner, or form, the model has changed. The model has affected me. I’ve been doing a radio show now for over 20 years. For 20 years, the original network that I was on had, it was Laura Ingraham, Michael Savage, Jerry Doherty. It was a great network, and we were on all over the country, and people would listen, they would stay tuned in.

Slowly but surely, radios change. People consume media differently. They listen via podcast. And again, I have to adjust to that. That it is the reality of the terrain. I have to adjust to what the situation is and how it presents itself. Radio is not gonna come back the way it was. It’s not possible.

They don’t even put AM radios in electric cars for crying out loud. Not as many people commuting. Not as many people listening. All these major radio networks, they’re basically on the verge of bankruptcy. And most people fail to realize it. The one medium out there that people want to watch live is sports. I don’t think I’ve ever watched.

a sporting event that wasn’t live. Like, I’m gonna miss the game, I’m gonna DVR it and watch later. No, no, it already happened, I can look up to see what the score is. It’s not the same. That’s why everybody’s flipping out right now. It’s flipping out here in New York because the Yankees for the first time in their history are gonna wear an advertising patch. That’s right, on the arm.

An advert to some insurance company is paying the Yankees $20 million a year to have a little patch on the arm. Now the European soccer teams, they’ve been doing this for an extended period of time. Listen, they gotta pay the bills. You wanna bring in all of these stars, all of this stuff? Hey, the money has to come from somewhere. And we all know what’s going on at movie theaters. It’s slowly but surely changed.

the technology got better. You used to go to a movie studio, oh my God, the sound would blow you away. You could put in a home theater system for a few hundred bucks and a huge TV on your wall and it sounds great. And guess what? When Hollywood decides to put out some three hour movie and you need to get up to go to the bathroom and wanna grab yourself a diet Coke, you can press pause. You can’t do that at the theater.

Again, I wanna see, again, I love the Mission Impossible franchise and I’m looking forward to seeing it, but I’ll wait. I mean, it’s gotta be a really crappy day outside to drag me to the movie theater. Just this. Again, it’s bloody expensive. When they come out, you know, a month or two after they’re released, the movie theater, you can buy the movie.

for about the same price the ticket was to go see it. Again, this is the reality of the terrain. And Fran Drescher, she’s lamenting, she’s yelling and screaming, oh, the business model’s changed, it’s gotta change. Yeah, there’s less money. There’s less money. It’s just that simple. Take a look at the box office, man. Disney spent, and she was getting mad at all the students,

Nine, close to $900 million, I guess, plus marketing costs for Indiana Jones and the dial of destiny.

hasn’t even made 200 million yet. That’s a big loss. I don’t know, Fran, but maybe you actors and actresses, maybe you might wanna, maybe you wanna participate. Maybe you wanna get paid. You don’t get a salary. How about you just get paid based upon how well the movie does? Oh, you’d never go for that. Oh yeah, you’re gonna want money on the back end. Absolutely. And when you become a star actor like Tom Cruise, which is just bankable.

You can ask that, but Fran, I don’t think you’re getting that. All due respect, okay? People are not gonna flock to the movie theaters to see the nanny movie. It’s just not going to happen. So again, but I’m gonna give both sides here, okay? The actors have a point when it comes to artificial intelligence. And I’m kind of looking into some of the things that these studios wanna do with extras.

I mean, these are the actors and actresses in the background that don’t make much at all. They don’t make diddly. They want to be able to scan these people and use them again and again and again throughout the picture so they only get paid for one day or that they can actually use them at other movies. Again, I get that. I get their point there. I would say that each and every actor and actress member of the union would have to give authorization.

to use their likeness. I don’t care if you’re Tom Cruise, I don’t care if you’re an extra. That’s just the way it has to be. This is the type of scary stuff that I don’t like. But again, a lot of the CGI and crap that they put in movies today, it’s just, again, I don’t go for it. It’s garbage to me. But again, they’re complaining about the money. They don’t just show me the money. And Fran again.

her Oscar-worthy performance. Oscar-worthy performance, oh my God. She was making it sound like, you know, that they were like digging ditches somewhere. Hey, all the unions around the world are sticking with us in the labor unions. Shut the hell up. And she’s going off on capitalism. Fran, you were just in Italy the day before hanging out with Kim Kardashian at the Dolce and Gabbana show.

I don’t have any problem with that. I just don’t like hypocrisy. That’s what I don’t like. I’m all about capitalism. I love capitalism. I want you to make as much money as possible. But guess what? The model has changed. And she’s talking about what CEOs are getting paid at these various, hundreds of millions of dollars. And again, I’m sure that there’ll be plenty.

Plenty of idiots out there that will buy into everything that she says. But I mean, come on, people. I mean, don’t be a sucker. Take a couple steps back. You see the lives that these people live and God bless them. I don’t care. I’m not the slightest bit envious. You get to that position, you work your butt off. I don’t care. Good for you. Okay.

But stop here. Stop trying to bring yourself down like you’re some sort of working man. Oh, the hard work. Oh, give me a break. Have you ever actually, you’ve ever seen a movie being produced? You have actually ever seen it? Well, I got a real up close and personal look. This is back, again, decades ago. Decades ago, I was going to school. I was fortunate enough to go to school. Thanks, mom and dad, for a period of time in Italy.

And I got the opportunity, staying at a hotel where they just so happened to be filming this movie, wasn’t a big hit by any stretch, Only You. And I had the time, it had Billy Zane in it, Marisa Tomei, and I wanted to meet her, I didn’t get a chance to meet her. Robert Downey Jr. did meet him. And this is Robert Downey Jr. prior to him going to jail.

I mean, he was bored out of his mind. This was in Positano. He was bored out of his mind there. It’s a very kind of beautiful place, but it’s a pretty quiet town. And again, this was pre-jail when he was getting himself into all sorts of trouble. But I actually, he was so nice. You know, got to sit down, talk with them funny, same type of personality. I don’t really have to act much to be Tony Stark as far as Iron Man is concerned. That basically was his personality. Anyway.

They walk a few steps, they take a picture. Again, I’m watching what’s taking place and I got a kick out of the entire thing. I mean, again, it’s not that big of a deal. Granted, you see performances out there by actors that can blow your mind and you kind of, you ask yourself how in the world that they do that. And I get it, it’s a craft and you can see who the good ones are and the bad ones are. Come on, come on, Fran, you guys are not.

you know, digging ditches, you’re not putting up homes, you’re not picking fruit in the fields. So again, okay, world’s smallest violin. Okay, I gotta share this forever fun. If you’ve got kids in the car, you gotta do the Vince Vaughn from old school. Earmuffs, earmuffs on the kids on this one, please put the earmuffs on. Okay, this was from, this was the scene that Fran Drescher played in Saturday Night Fever.

Her name was Connie. She goes up to Tony, who’s John Travolta’s character. She goes, so tell me, are you as good in bed as you are on the dance floor? And you know, they’re still dancing a few minutes later. So when is Connie gonna get her answer? And again, no one can do Fran Gresh’s voice. Very, very difficult to do. Tony comes back. You know, Connie, if you’re as good in bed as you are on the dance floor, I bet you’re one lousy beep.

Tony comes back. Then how come they always send me flowers the next morning? Tony comes back. Cause most guys don’t know a lousy beep when they’ve had one. Or I don’t know, maybe they thought you was dead. Watchdog on wallstreet.com.