Promising closed-door talks aimed at settling Hollywood’s three-month-old strike by movie and television writers have been jolted in the last few days by the actions of some prominent guild leaders, the New York Times reports.

Phil Alden Robinson, best known as the writer and director of “Field of Dreams” and a member of the governing board of the Writers Guild of America West, has publicly called for a toughened bargaining position. He expressed wariness over modeling any prospective deal on a new contract recently reached between production companies and the Directors Guild of America.

His critique was posted Tuesday on a Web site called United Hollywood and linked on the guild’s site, and came despite a news blackout and an earlier request by the guild’s president, Patric M. Verrone, that members show restraint during ticklish informal talks that may lead to a resumption of formal negotiations.

That development came amid some reduction in the good will from a Friday peace-making dinner that matched Mr. Verrone and his chief lieutenant, David J. Young, with Leslie Moonves, chief executive of CBS, and his labor relations chief, Harry Isaacs.

Mr. Moonves has learned that Mr. Young, on the day of their dinner, invited Wall Street analysts to hear a negative presentation about his company. In a letter dated Jan. 25, Mr. Young asked CBS investors to a Feb. 5 session in New York. Guild leaders promised to discuss then what they say are dimming prospects for CBS, and to point out what they see as “conflicts of interest in the governance” of the company, because of its overlapping ownership with Viacom.

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