Walking off the set or halting production of a new season is nothing new to the television industry. It’s a right of passage, a game to play, in the struggle of actor contract negotiations. Just this year, the six principal voices of the Simpson’s characters halted production demanding an increase in salary from $125,000 per episode to $360,000.

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However last week, the balance of power shifted back to CBS and all the studios with the firing of actors George Eads and Jorja Fox who play play investigators Nick Stokes and Sara Sidle on the hit CBS crime drama CSI, as Les Moonves, CBS chief, called the duo’s bluff. Fox and Eads were negotiating for a raise in their $100,000-per-episode pay.

‘There comes a point where we feel a contract is a contract. … We all have to look out for the future of the network television business,’ said Moonves. Differing from his 2003 policy of just telling the writers to rewrite the first episode of “Everybody Loves Raymond,” to incorporate the absence of Garrett into the script, Moonves decided this time to eliminate the characters immediately by the two firings.

When questioned about the concern he had in regards to the top-rated series, Moonves simply said “Of course.” It is speculated by Moonves that other cast members Eric Szmanda and Paul Guilfoyle could take over larger roles. However, there are attempts to recast the two castmembers as Moonves stated that although the characters portrayed by Eads and Fox had not been recast, CBS was “looking at certain people.”

The filming of CSI has been halted for a week while scripts are edited to reflect the casting changes.