Look out Hollywood snobs, the French are going to invade Cannes...

[insein]

http://au.news.yahoo.com/040505/11/ov63.html

Thursday May 6, 02:26 AM


Angry Showbiz Workers Threaten Cannes Festival

PARIS (Reuters) - The world's most glamorous film showcase is bracing for possible disruptions by out-of-work French actors and stagehands protesting a change to their unemployment benefits.
Culture Minister Renaud Donnedieu de Vabres Wednesday announced the creation of a temporary fund to help part-time entertainment industry workers in a bid to quell their anger ahead of the Cannes festival, which runs from May 12 to 23.

However the Communist-led CGT union, which represents the majority of workers in the sector, rejected the 20-million-euro ($24.3 million) fund as inadequate and pledged to step up its year-long protests. ADVERTISEMENT

"We can already say at this stage that the 2004 Cannes festival will be memorable," it said in a statement.

The Riviera resort, a magnet for Hollywood movers and shakers, is scheduled to play host this year to stars including Brad Pitt and Charlize Theron. Veronique Cayla, general director of the festival, said organizers were working with unions to prevent any recurrence of the type of protests which forced the cancellation of a spate of French music and theater festivals last summer.

"We are working on ways of giving them a platform," she told the daily Liberation. Security at the Palais des Festivals, the main venue for film screenings, will be particularly tight in the wake of the Madrid train bombings in March.

"We do not expect the Palais des Festivals to be taken by storm. But we can't control everything. Provocateurs and hard-liners can join this just cause and spoil the party which the festival should rightly be," Cayla said.

In a bid to defuse tension, Donnedieu de Vabres will travel to Cannes to keep up talks with union officials on the sidelines of official events.

"I am calling for everybody to show respect for the artists, for their output, for the public and simply for the pride and international reputation of our country," the minister told parliament during question time.

The Cannes film festival has weathered its share of skirmishes in recent years.

In 2002, U.S. delegates threatened to boycott the festival on charges that France was anti-Semitic and last year, relations with the United States were at a low ebb over France's opposition to the war in Iraq. The show went on regardless.

(Additional reporting by Elizabeth Pineau)

Out of work Frenchmen. Look out Michael Moore.