Jamie Lee Curtis Digs Herself Out Of Comments About SAG-AFTRA Strike

We’re a little more than three weeks into the actors’ strike, a landmark action taken by the Screen Actors Guild and American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) after contract negotiations with studio and streaming consortium the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) ground to a halt. That strike, which prohibits actors from certain types of promotional conversations about past or upcoming projects, was predicted to shut down the Hollywood media machine. 

But those wise pundits didn’t seem to account for one fact: Many actors can’t seem to restrain themselves from speaking publicly, and without the ability to promote film or TV work, they’re opining—often confusingly—about the labor action. The latest of those is Oscar winner Jamie Lee Curtis, who took to social media Saturday to walk back earlier comments that seemed to indicate a lack of support for the strike.

It’s a cycle that’s becoming all too familiar as the double writer/actor strike continues: First out of the comment-and-recant gate was Heels actor/American Ninja Warrior aspirant Stephen Amell, who announced at a comic book convention that the strike was “myopic” and ”a reductive negotiating tactic.” A backlash from supporters ensued, and in a subsequent Instagram post, Amell said that those remarks were “clearly contradictory to my true feelings and my emphatic statement that I stand with my union.” 

Soon to follow was outspoken fan of anti-trans pundit Jordan Peterson/Shazam! star Zachary Levi, who said “I fully support my union, the WGA, and the strike,” after a clip of Levi saying that restrictions on project promotion are “so dumb” at another comic book convention was surfaced. That comment, he said, was “made in jest” and “taken out of context.”

And now we have Jamie Lee Curtis, whose late parents, Tony Curtis and Janet Leigh, were prominent figures during Hollywood’s last double strike in 1960, even opening their home for a union meeting to help actors understand the purpose of the labor action. 

Those royal roots didn’t come up on Thursday, when Curtis spoke with Variety at a star-studded groundbreaking ceremony for food security nonprofit Project Angel Food, for which Curtis is an honorary chair. At the Los Angeles event, which marked the kickoff of an ambitious $51 million project to expand the organization’s footprint in the city, Curtis told red carpet reporter Marc Malkin that “I don’t like the rhetoric on both sides” of the negotiations between her guild and studios.

“I’m more Switzerland. I’m not a polarized person here,” she said. “I don’t like the them vs. us. The fact that there’s a them and an us bothers me. It’s one industry and I hope that all of the sides can recognize the oneness of our industry.”

At that same event, she spoke, on camera, with Reuters, reiterating her “Switzerland” aspirations, and saying “we’ll all have to give up something to get something.”

In Curtis’s case, it took a few days before the inevitable Instagram post clarifying exactly where she stands (on the picket line), but that did indeed come Saturday evening. In a two-photo post depicting a SAG-AFTRA strike icon and Curtis posing with a picket sign, Curtis wrote (sic throughout) “I FULLY SUPPORT the @sagaftra strike, have volunteered making signs multiple times and have donated to the relief fund. I SUPPORT the leadership and SUPPORT our demands. I’m a rank-and-file union member. I am not on any negotiating committee. I believe we have to look at all sides in any conflict in order to find resolution, solution and a fair and equitable settlement.”