Finally, some fresh air from what had become a rather old fish in the garbage.  In what is being called a “joint release” SAG and the AMPTP are saying that have indeed finally reached a tentative deal.

LOS ANGELES (April 17, 2009) – The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers and Screen Actors Guild today announced that the parties have reached tentative agreement on successor agreements to the Producer-Screen Actors Guild Codified Basic Agreement.

Details of the agreement covering television programs and motion pictures will not be disclosed prior to review by the SAG national board of directors this Sunday, April 19, at a previously scheduled board meeting via videoconference in Los Angeles and New York.

Screen Actors Guild’s negotiators will present the tentative agreement to the Screen Actors Guild national board of directors for approval and referral to the membership for ratification.

The statement said that no details would be disclosed until Sunday following review by SAG’s national board. That group, which saw a control shift last fall to a more moderate coalition, is expected to approve the terms of the pact which will send ratification ballots to its 120,000 members.

The ratification process will take about three weeks. SAG president Alan Rosenberg and his allies in the hardline Membership First faction, which lost its board majority, has vowed it will urge members to vote down the deal on grounds that it falls short in on on multitude of areas, particularly new media.