The ]. First I've heard of a lockout. Anyone know any more information than is stated in the article?
I believe the League had announced way back when that should Local 1
strike, the stagehands would subsequently be locked out of the theaters until a contract was in place and the
strike was lifted.
The
current Grinch situation as I understand it, is that the producers of Grinch had a one time only contract for a limited run. Local 1 would have honored that contract, but as Jujamcyn owned that theater and is abiding by the League negotiations, they will not allow the "
house"
IATSE members back into the theater.
The Grinch
producer subsequently sued the Jujamycn Corp. for breach or some such.
Jujamycn also filed a $35 million suit against Local 1 today. Here's a NY Times clip:
The Nederlander Producing Company, which owns 9 of the 27 Broadway theaters affected by the stagehands’
strike, is suing their union for $35 million in damages, claiming that the
strike against the Nederlander theaters is illegal.
The producers of seven of the shows in Nederlander theaters joined in the suit, which was filed in Federal District Court in Manhattan yesterday.
While the Nederlander company is a member of the League of American Theaters and Producers, and company officials have been sitting in on the negotiations alongside the league, Nederlander has a separate, and somewhat different, contract with the union.
It expired at the same time that the league’s contract does, however. Before the talks started, Nederlander and the union agreed that they would offer each other at least the same terms that are in the league’s contract with the union once it had been settled.
Because of this agreement, Nederlander theaters declined to participate when the league imposed some of its proposed work rules on the stagehands last month. But the Nederlander officials did say in a letter to the union that they would lock the stagehands out if they struck other theaters in the league.
Nothing in the agreement prevents either side from striking or from locking union members out. As it turned out, the stagehands did
strike the Nederlander theaters.
But the lawsuit argues that the union has been striking the Nederlander theaters solely to make the organization pressure the league to
settle — making the
strike against the Nederlanders essentially, the suit argues, an unlawful secondary boycott.
As evidence, the suit points to the signs held by striking stagehands in front of the Nederlander theaters, which refer only to the league, not the Nederlanders.
A spokesman for the stagehands’ union said it had not been notified of the suit and could not comment.
Meanwhile, the legal subplot thickened for “Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical.”
The producers of “Grinch” filed an injunction yesterday to reopen the show, and a hearing was held in State Supreme Court in Manhattan. The union has ordered the picket
line to come down at the St. James Theater, where “Grinch” was playing, arguing that a
strike against that show was unfair because there were some separately negotiated rules for the stagehands.
Officials from the Jujamcyn theater chain, which owns the St. James and is technically the employer of the stagehands, said they would not reopen any of their five theaters until a deal was reached with the union. In other words, Jujamcyn was locking out the St. James stagehands.
In a courtroom filled with child actors from “Grinch,” John G. Hutchinson, the lawyer for the show’s producers, based his argument on the show’s contract, which has some special amendments that had been negotiated with the union — amendments mostly dealing with the show’s extended schedule of 12 to 15 performances a week.
But Neil Abramson, the lawyer for Jujamcyn, said the minor amendments to the “Grinch” contract had nothing to do with Jujamcyn’s right to lock out workers in a labor dispute, a right that was explicitly upheld in the show’s contract with the theater.
As for why Jujamcyn was locking the stagehands out, Mr. Abramson said it was to prevent a situation in which the theater is open and filled with children and the stagehands’ union suddenly decides to
strike again.
The judge adjourned the case until this morning.
Moving on from the legal drama, the four Broadway shows set to take part in Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade tomorrow will perform as scheduled. Three are in theaters unaffected by the
strike, and the fourth, “Legally Blonde,” is going ahead anyway.
The “Blonde” performers, however, have had to figure out new costumes because the wardrobe union is honoring the stagehands’ picket
line.
And the producers’ league released last week’s ticket grosses yesterday. They were, well, skimpy. Broadway did $2.9 million in ticket sales, plus whatever was sold at “Young Frankenstein,” the only show not reporting its grosses.
To put that into perspective, the grosses two weeks ago were around $16.7 million — again, plus whatever “Young Frankenstein” sold.