Dear Gossips,

One of the most popular memes that’s emerged over the last few years is from the Arrowverse. It’s a photo of Grant Gustin posing at the gravesite of Oliver Queen.

The meme is basically schadenfreude – celebrating the downfall of a person or an institution and as the Twitter, or X, user notes above, Stephen Amell, who played Oliver Queen, aka the Green Arrow, hates it. We know this because…

As you may have heard, the meme has taken on new meaning today following Stephen Amell’s comments about the strike. If you’ve been visiting this site over the last few weeks, it should be pretty clear where we stand – firmly with the writers and the actors, the creatives who’ve been given no choice but to call a work stoppage because the struck companies refuse to share the wealth. So I’m not wasting time here repeating Stephen’s comments. What I do want to point out is how Deadline covered the story.

This paragraph in particular stood out to me:

“Amell has become one of, if not the most, high-profile actors to speak out against the Fran Drescher-led SAG AFTRA strike against the AMPTP. While both the actors and writers strikes have received positive support from a majority of union and guild members publicly, it’s important to note that not everyone supports them.”

Do you smell it? It’s right there in the last sentence: “it’s important to note that not everyone supports them”.

As Sarah has mentioned many times, most of the industry trades are owned by the same media company that owns Dick Clark Productions and the Golden Globes; and most of the publications have been largely perceived to be sympathetic to the studios and the producers. It was Deadline that published the quote from an anonymous studio executive a few weeks ago that incensed the unions – the one about their intent to “drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses”.

This most recent comment then, that “it’s important to note that not everyone supports them” – is it meant to sow discord? These tactics are common in work stoppage situations. When fracture is fomented, it can only benefit the corporations. As the unions have said repeatedly, the best offence against the conglomerates is solidarity and that’s why the struck companies are trying to break through it. More and more, though, as the strike continues, we could be seeing an escalation of this kind of insidious narrative being passed around.

As a palate cleanser then, I present to you another Canadian star who was out on the picket lines yesterday. Here’s Seth Rogen with Martin Starr outside Paramount yesterday alongside his peers.

Yours in gossip,

Lainey

Stephen Amell Gossip

About