ran Drescher may have been “The Nanny” in another life. But as the president of SAG-AFTRA, she turned the tables on Hollywood’s power crowd.
Drescher last year emerged as an unlikely labor leader and champion of the little guy. Best known for her zany 1990s sitcom character with the thick Queens, N.Y., accent, Drescher became one of the most powerful people in Los Angeles by holding firm, despite pressure and personal attacks, until her 160,000-member performers union won its most generous deal in decades. The contract brought an estimated $1 billion in gains for members over three years.In an industry shaped over the decades by bombastic and hard-charging men, Drescher embraced her idiosyncratic and unabashedly female style. She offered spiritual teachings and brought a Jellycat plush toy to the negotiating table, positioning the small, smiling white heart at her place opposite Walt Disney Co. Chief Executive Bob Iger to remind the CEOs that they, too, could lead with heart.
“Whatever I do, I don’t do halfway,” Drescher, 66, told The Times. “I bring my own sense of self, my Buddhist wisdom and a lot of chutzpah.Initially, entertainment executives anticipated last year’s labor tensions would follow a predictable pattern: Screenwriters, represented by the Writers Guild of America, would strike but eventually lose momentum and turn on one another, creating internal fractures that would prompt union leaders to cave and accept a mediocre deal.
‘I am shocked by the way the people that we have been in business with are treating us.’
— Fran Drescher
The studio chiefs underestimated Drescher and SAG-AFTRA chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, who led guild members to the picket lines in mid-July, joining the WGA. The actors’ strike immediately intensified the pain felt by studios and reinvigorated the scribes, who’d already spent 2½ months off the job. Nearly all Hollywood movie and scripted TV production halted. Stars refused to promote their projects and some movies tanked at the box office. The studios had to wage a two-pronged battle.
It was Drescher who helped to reframe the fight not as a contract dispute between studios and actors, but as part of a larger class struggle in America. Standing before a phalanx of cameras and reporters at SAG-AFTRA’s Wilshire Boulevard headquarters on July 13, the TV star scolded Hollywood’s celebrated executives for bowing to Wall Street values while leaving lower-level workers behind.
“I am shocked by the way the people that we have been in business with are treating us,” Drescher said sternly that day. “… How they plead poverty. That they’re losing money left and right when giving hundreds of millions of dollars to their CEOs. It is disgusting. Shame on them.”Drescher’s electric and improvised speech, which prompted cheers and tears on picket lines, elevated the strike into a cause célèbre. It helped unite Hollywood’s labor guilds, despite the loss of work and the damage to the local economy, because members saw themselves in a shared fight for the survival of their professions.
In what was dubbed her “Norma Rae” moment, Drescher seemed to channel Sally Field’s Oscar-winning portrayal of a defiant North Carolina textile mill worker turned union organizer. Some studio executives privately pooh-poohed Drescher, dismissing her tactics and presentation as a theatrical performance.
She quickly became the chief irritant of members of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which negotiates on behalf of Disney, Netflix and other studios. But the alliance eventually bent to Drescher’s demands for bonuses for actors on successful streaming shows and protections against the threat of artificial intelligence. She wrangled the famously fractious and partisan SAG-AFTRA membership throughout the strike and contract ratification. Members in December voted overwhelmingly in favor of a deal despite some concerns that the AI protocols were not sufficient.
The Times sat down with Drescher in late November. She described her “defining moment,” her leadership during the strike and challenges for women in power. This interview was edited for length and clarity.
What role did your personal strengths play in what you accomplished last year?
I don’t think that I could have gotten through 2023 without my Buddhist wisdom, which helped guide me. People were trying to diminish me, diminish a woman in power, [but] as long as you stay in your center, and remain authentic, and see everything as an opportunity, then you can deflect and grow and become more empowered to meet the moment.
