Chris Shiflett of the Foo Fighters, Tampa Bay’s Evan Longoria, CSI:NY’s Hill Harper, Award-Winning Broadcaster Bob Butler, Breaking Bad’s R.J. Mitte and Other Celebs Tweet for Unions During First Ever Labor Day Tweet-a-Thon
Actors’ Equity, AFTRA, Screen Actors Guild Members and Major League
Baseball Players among the Labor Day Tweeters!
LOS ANGELES (Sept. 3, 2010) — This Labor Day, people who work in the sports, entertainment and news media industries—baseball players, actors, recording artists, Broadway performers, broadcasters and more—are coming together on Twitter to celebrate unions. With Oscar, Grammy, Emmy, Tony, Pulitzer and Players Choice awards and nominations under their belts, they all have one thing in common: they’re union members.
And so this Labor Day weekend, union members across the entertainment, sports, and news media industries are uniting with a common purpose—to tweet about the advantages of being a #unionmember for them and for workers in each sector of the economy, all in 140 characters or less.
Just a few of those participating this year include Chris Shiflett of the Foo Fighters, Tampa Bay third baseman Evan Longoria, Minnesota outfielder Michael Cuddyer, Texas pitcher C.J. Wilson, CSI:NY star Hill Harper, Breaking Bad star R.J. Mitte, award-winning broadcast journalist and reporter for KCBS in San Francisco Bob Butler, as well as Actors’ Equity Association members from across the country.
The Labor Day Tweet-a-Thon is a joint project of workers’ rights group American Rights at Work, the country’s leading entertainment unions, Actors’ Equity, AFTRA, and Screen Actors Guild and the Major League Baseball Players Association.
Labor Day is not a just a day to commemorate the protections, rights, and opportunities that labor unions and workers’ rights advocates have achieved in years past. It’s a day to broadcast the critical role unions play today for all workers–in showbiz–and in every industry.
Says AFTRA member and broadcaster Bob Butler, “Being a union member takes the guesswork out of how I'm going to live in retirement.”
For more information visit http://www.unionmember.org. Throughout Labor Day weekend the site will display a round-up of celebrity tweets, as well as tweets from union members and supporters who use the #unionmember hashtag.
Contacts:
Christopher de Haan
AFTRA
323.634.8203
cdehaan@aftra.com.
twitter.com/AFTRA
Pamela Greenwalt
Screen Actors Guild
(323) 440-2892
pgreenwalt@sag.org
twitter.com/SAGnews
Chris Dahl
MLBPA
(212) 826-0808
chrisd@mlbpa.org
twitter.com/mlb_players
Doug Pennington
American Rights at Work
(202) 822-2127 x118
(202) 215-6350 (cell)
dpennington@americanrightsatwork.org
twitter.com/morfaleji
Maria Somma
Actors’ Equity
212.869.8530 x425
917-560-3488 (cell)
msomma@actorsequity.org
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About AFTRA
The American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, AFL-CIO, are the people who entertain and inform America. In 32 Locals across the country, AFTRA members work as actors, journalists, singers, dancers, announcers, hosts, comedians, disc jockeys, and other performers across the media industries including television, radio, cable, sound recordings, music videos, commercials, audio books, non-broadcast industrials, interactive games, the Internet and other digital media. The 70,000 professional performers, broadcasters, and recording artists of AFTRA are working together to protect and improve their jobs, lives, and communities in the 21st century. From new art forms to new technology, AFTRA members embrace change in their work and craft to enhance American culture and society. Visit AFTRA online at www.aftra.com.