(AFL)
George M. Cohan led fellow producers, all members of the Producing Managers' Association, to form this organization as a countermove to the establishment of Actors' Equity Association in 1919. The goal was to mitigate what the producers saw as Equity's overly stringent demands for improved salaries and working conditions. Cohan and the other producers persuaded some older, established members of the acting profession to join AFL, but AEA's membership, which derisively referred to AFL as "Fido," far outstripped AFL's and with the Actors' Equity strike of 1919, the AFL became meaningless.
The Historical Dictionary of the American Theater. James Fisher.