Voight explains SAG show absence

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 26 (UPI) -- Actor Jon Voight has taken out a full-page ad in Variety explaining why he won't attend next month's Screen Actors Guild Awards in Los Angeles.

Voight was nominated for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor in a Television Movie or Miniseries category for his role in "The Five People You Meet In Heaven," but was told by SAG he was not invited to the Feb. 5 ceremony, World Entertainment News Network reported Wednesday.

He resigned from the union, a move SAG often refers to as seeking "financial core" status that allows members to give up full membership but continue to pay dues. Resigning also bars members from various union activities, including awards shows.

Voight says he first considered taking financial-core status to help out a friend whose movie had run into financial trouble, but quit after SAG used what he called "scare tactics" to shut down the movie.

"The SAG board chose to bring me once again what they think is shame," Voight wrote, "and apparently to warn other actors off joining financial core, by announcing to the press that I was not invited to the ceremony to which my fellow actors nominated me for a union film. All this because of my willingness to uphold the right to our personal pursuit of freedom and liberty ..."