SAG-AFTRA

Spring 2023

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O nscreen, she's played a surfer, a flying nun, Forrest Gump's mother, Peter Parker's aunt and a union organizer. In real life, she's been an advocate for everything from civil and LGBTQ+ rights to women's health and the environment. Her name is Sally Field, and at the SAG Awards on Feb. 26, she was honored as the 58th SAG Life Achievement Award recipient. Field, who fell in love with acting as a junior high schooler in her hometown of Pasadena, California, joined SAG in 1965, after being Taft-Hartley'd on the sitcom Gidget, in which she starred as the eponymous upbeat, boy-crazy main character. What followed after Gidget's only season was a string of other family-friendly sitcom roles: Sister Bertrille on The Flying Nun (1967–1970) and Sally Burton on The Girl With Something Extra (1973–1974) among others. But it would be years of work with legendary acting teacher Lee Strasberg at The Actors Studio and her landing the titular role in the TV miniseries Sybil (1976) that would first make Field a breakout talent. Her portrayal of the character, a young girl seeking help for her dissociative identity disorder, not only earned her an Emmy Award, but allowed her to make a successful transition to the big screen. Although it's quite common in today's industry to see female actors do both TV and film, Field detailed how this fluidity was rare when she was starting out. "In those days, there was a really stringent class distinction [between TV and film], and I don't know a lot of women at that time who easily transitioned between situation comedy to film. Men did but … women couldn't do it. They weren't allowed. "I [didn't] blame it on the industry; you can't blame the weather on the clouds. The only thing I could do was say to myself that when I got good enough — really good enough — something would change," Field told SAG-AFTRA. From Sybil came dozens of memorable film roles: Smokey and the Bandit (1977); Norma Rae (1979) and Places in the Heart (1984), both of which earned Field Academy Awards for Best Actress; Steel Magnolias (1989); and Forrest Gump (1994). These productions, along with on-stage roles in The Glass Menagerie and Arthur Miller's All My Sons, solidified her as a household name, while the next generation became acquainted with her in Mrs. Doubtfire (1993) as the romantic counterpart to the late Robin Williams, and as Aunt May in Sony's The Amazing Spider-Man franchise (2012–2014). Said SAG-AFTRA President Fran Drescher, "Sally is an amazing actor with an enormous range and an uncanny ability to embody any character. She's a massive star with a working actor's ethos." In being recognized for her career and humanitarian accomplishments, her performing peers were foremost on her mind, "the ones who really know what it takes," she called them. "This award is from the actors," Field told SAG-AFTRA following the ceremony. "In my almost 60 years of being here, [actors are] the group I most wanted to be respected by. I wanted to be hired by the producers and I wanted the directors to want to work with me, but I wanted to be respected by the actors. This means everything to me." Field also expressed her appreciation for the work the union does. "I can tell you right now how different the industry is because of the work that SAG-AFTRA has done," she said. "Unions and being able to bargain for fairness in the workplace are vital. People in any workplace need to know that the ability to group together and fight together to get a better work situation is vitally important." Nominated and voted on by the SAG-AFTRA National Honors and Tributes Committee, the SAG Life Achievement Award is bestowed to those who have contributed to improving the image of the acting profession and have a history of active involvement in public service endeavors.

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