Writers Guild of America (WGA) strike news 2 2

[Bosco685]

Turns out part of the strike has to do with streaming service show practices (22-episode traditional shows are now 6-10 episode shows leading to less committed pay).

 

What a Writers' Strike Means for Viewers at Home

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The Writers Guild of America (WGA) last night authorized a strike. It has been negotiating with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) for better compensation and equity structures and, in mid-April, held a strike authorization vote that saw record numbers of unit members (97.85%) voting yes. The strike went into effect at 12:01 am Pacific Time on Tuesday, May 2 after negotiations failed.

 

The WGA represents nearly 12,000 writers working in show business; they write television, films, and other literary works, like scripted podcasts and streaming shows. In mid-April, SAG-AFTRA—the Screen Actors Guild—issued a statement of support for the WGA.

 

What Is The WGA Strike About?
In the age of streaming, one of the main sources of income for writers—residuals—in “new media” formats has almost completely disappeared. Residual income in television comes from shows and movies when they are rerun after airing, released online or via DVDs and Blu-rays, or syndicated via a network. Residuals have faced a steady decline over the past decade, especially for television writers, compounded by streaming services who—on average—pay out lower than network residuals. The removal of shows from streaming services entirely means that no residuals are paid out at all. What used to be a cornerstone of writers’ incomes has turned into an unsafe and unsustainable gamble.

 

Additionally, like many industries, film and TV writers are still relatively constrained to a couple key locations: Los Angeles and New York City, which are not exactly the cheapest places to live. According to the WGA, more and more writers are working at the minimum salary requirement for their positions. Compounded with a lack of upward movement in the industry, and the fact that jobs come with no guarantees for longevity or stability, many writers live precariously, paycheck to paycheck, in expensive cities with little hope of establishing themselves.

 

What Are the WGA’s Demands?
The WGA has focused on a “pattern of demands” to address these inequalities and difficulties. A pattern of demand is a set of demands that the union representatives will push for during negotiations, which have been voted on by the larger organization unit. According to the WGA site, these demands include increasing minimum compensation, expanding protections to cover all television writers, and increasing residuals for “under-compensated reuse markets.”

 

More generally, the WGA is asking for better professional standards and protections for writers who are employed within the industry. These include regulations for AI and dataset-trained technology, stronger regulation of options and exclusivity clauses in contracts for TV writers, and enacting measures to combat discrimination and harassment.

 

Ultimately the demands are an existential ask for writers—this strike stands in between writing for a living and writing turning into a gig economy. The ask from the writers would increase guild compensation by 500 million dollars — a far lower sum than the billions that studios and streamers make every year, and less than is spent on shows like Game of Thrones, Stranger Things, Citadel, and Rings of Power. You can read the full list of demands here and read the proposals/counter proposals, publicly released by the WGA along with the announcement of the strike.

 

Edited September 6, 2023 by Bosco685

[Bosco685]

The 'so what' of the matter:

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What Happened During the Last Writer’s Strike?
The last writer’s strike happened 15 years ago, in November 2007, and lasted until February 2008. There were similar issues on the table—namely, residuals and what was then called “new media,” which we now call streaming. The WGA successfully laid the groundwork for covering streaming services before Netflix or Amazon got into producing their own content, which meant that when they did, they had to hire Guild writers to do so.

 

During the strike, the networks almost universally suffered; they all noted a significant drop in viewership, and many networks fired staff in order to compensate for the lack of production work. At that time reality shows and reality television were not covered under the WGA, and many reality shows were ordered at networks. Very few of those shows stuck around. Many showrunners, actors, and late-night hosts vocally supported the strike and marched alongside writers.

 

What Does the WGA Strike Mean For Sci-Fi and Fantasy?
One source told Variety, “The writers’ concerns are completely and objectively valid, which has the studios and producers a bit more rattled than they’d like to admit.”

 

The truth is that the strike would have to be protracted before there was any noticeable change in film or television output. The first and hardest hit will be the nighttime talk shows, who will not have writers working, and who will not be able to perform any work that would have been written by a Guild member—and in fact, have already started announcing hiatus plans. Remember when Conan O’Brien literally spun his wedding ring on his desk to take up time rather than attempt to go against the WGA demands?

 

Regardless, the studios stand to lose a lot of money. Fifteen years ago, estimates ranged widely on the effect of the strike on the bottom line, anywhere from $300 to 500 million. According to Bloomberg, the City of Los Angeles lost $1.5 billion. What a strike means is that writers across all genres, media, and services are going to stop writing and will refuse to do any kind of work until the union has reached an acceptable agreement. Scott Purdy told Yahoo Finance that “consumers should prepare for some of their favorite TV shows to be delayed and to potentially enter a period where there’s a limited amount of new content to watch.”

 

Despite the fact that it might take a while for audiences to see the reprecussions on screen, two of the biggest, most expensive shows in television—HBO Max’s House of the Dragon and Amazon’s The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power—are currently in production and filming their upcoming seasons. In 2007-2008, showrunners, also known as multi-hyphenate writer-producers, were asked to continue production duties, but many cited their alliance with WGA and refused to continue working and were fired.

 

There’s also the fact that the strike is occuring during the “For Your Consideration” event schedule for the Emmys. Many shows are doing special FYC events across LA and NYC, and it’s unclear how a strike will affect the FYC campaigns or how writers, showrunners, and actors will respond during a strike when they are supposed to be promoting their work from 2022. While not in the FYC schedule this year, Good Omens is another example of completed work being affected—Neil Gaiman said on Twitter that while the show was “completed and handed in,” he “may not be able to promote it” as he’d hoped.

 

Although Teamsters and SAG-AFTRA have advised their members to continue to work, they stand with the WGA. However, there are some protections for workers written into both Teamsters and SAG contracted workers who refuse to cross a physical picket line if they would have to do so to get to work.

 

What Does This Mean for Audiences at Home?
This is a good thing. After the writer’s strike ended in 2008, we got some of the best television we had seen in years—critic Emily St. James notes that the subsequent seasons of Breaking Bad and Mad Men, for example, were some of the best we had ever seen. Other shows like Party Down, Community, and even Kings got their chance to show off on channels that usually wouldn’t have greenlit those projects. Sure, reality television kind of sucked for a while, but none of it lasted very long. And yes, maybe the writer’s strike likely led to the renewal of The Apprentice, which elevated Donald Trump’s profile, which might have led him to run for president in 2016, but who truly knows!

 

The point here is that writers are on strike because they cannot live under the current conditions. Nobody wants to go on strike—it genuinely sucks. Speaking from experience, it’s stressful and scary and overall not a good time. But this will make Hollywood better. This will make writing better. It will support new talent, give people a chance to establish themselves as writers, and ultimately, it will lead to some absolutely incredible film and television. The world deserves good film and television. And film and television writers deserve to earn a living.

 

[Bosco685]

 

[Eclipse]

I work in TV and movies so this kinda sucks. Just pay them what they want.

[Xenosmilus]

Is it me or are you happy that the carp that's coming out of Hollywood may stop while the strike is going on?

[MattTheDuck]

On 5/2/2023 at 6:53 PM, Xenosmilus said:

Is it me or are you happy that the carp that's coming out of Hollywood may stop while the strike is going on?

Well, it would be pretty hard to justify more money if it were based on quality.

[Bosco685]

 

[rexinnih]

Well the benefit to me is that I may be able to finally catch up on a few shows...

[CAHokie]

I support the writers though I know little about their pay particulars. There is another downside to this as well. The studios  may take this opportunity to cancel projects that were in the writing stages right now but haven’t actually started filming. I know of a few good projects that are at risk 

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 5/2/2023 at 9:53 PM, Xenosmilus said:

Is it me or are you happy that the carp that's coming out of Hollywood may stop while the strike is going on?

I told my friends that this strike seems ill-timed because the quality of writing in recent years may be the worst I have seen in my entire life.

[TupennyConan]

I believe the WGA sees AI as an issue [a threat to human creatives, that is] in this negotiation.  

[Bosco685]

The more this guy talks lately, the more he convinces me WB Studios generated him out of a traditional WB exec mold.

[chrisco37]

On 5/4/2023 at 7:17 AM, TupennyConan said:

I believe the WGA sees AI as an issue [a threat to human creatives, that is] in this negotiation.  

[theCapraAegagrus]

On 5/5/2023 at 12:17 PM, Bosco685 said:

The more this guy talks lately, the more he convinces me WB Studios generated him out of a traditional WB exec mold.

He has no need to worry about DC at least, since his new CEO can just write them all himself.

[Bosco685]

Disney doing its magic, demanding showrunners continue their work during a writers' strike.

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The letter from the legal department of ABC Signature, owned by Disney, reads: “We want specifically to reiterate to you as a showrunner or other writer-producer that you are not excused from performing your duties as a showrunner and/or producer on your series as a result of the WGA strike. Your personal services agreement with [the] Studio requires that you perform your showrunner and/or producing duties even if the WGA attempts to fine you for performing such services during the strike,” wrote Bob McPhail, the assistant chief counsel for the Disney-owned ABC Signature, in the letter sent to showrunners and obtained by The Hollywood Reporter. “Your duties as a showrunner and/or producer are not excused, suspended or terminated until and unless you are so notified in writing by the Studio.”

 

The memo specifically states that in showrunner and/or writer-producer roles, “you may, along with other non-writing services, be required to perform services commonly referred to as ‘a. thorough h.’ services as a producer,” such as cutting for time, small changes to dialogue or narration made before or during production and “changes in technical or stage directions.” These are duties that, according to the WGA’s contract, non-writers can perform on covered projects.

 

However, the WGA strike rules explicitly prohibit union members from performing these activities during the 2023 work stoppage. “The Rules prohibit hyphenates (members who are employed in dual capacities) from performing any writing services, including the ‘(a) through (h)’ functions,” the rules state, which puts showrunners and writer-producers in a difficult position, caught between the dictates of their employers and their union.

 

“A lot of it sounds … wrong? A-H duties are specifically outlined by the guild as things you cannot do,” said one longtime showrunner of the Disney memo. This person did not receive that memo, as they do not have a deal with Disney. “But legally, I’m sure there’s a lot of tussling over this stuff. Long story short, this doc is fooling no writer. It’s just odd because it’s written almost as though we were trying to organize a company that wasn’t already unionized. Like, we’re all already in the union, man.”

 

[Eclipse]

They are walking around all the stages we are at in NY shutting down shows, mine is done filming so mine wont get shut down

[Bosco685]

Deep fake tech and AI scripts taking over Hollywood.

[Bosco685]

 

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UPDATED with more studios: The writers strike is now impacting overall deals. Just days into the work stoppage, major TV studios have started sending out letters to writer/producers under overall agreements, telling them that their deals are being suspended.

 

No one would comment but I hear Warner Bros. Television, Universal Studio Group, CBS Studios and Disney Television Studios’ 20th Television and ABC Signature are among those that have sent such notifications, with Sony Pictures Television relaying the message in conversations with representatives or informal emails. I hear the letters started going out Thursday and Friday; with some talent getting calls at the end of this week, to be followed by formal letters Monday. UPDATE: HBO’s notifications also have gone out. David Simon revealed on Twitter that he got the call about his deal being suspended “after 25 years of writing television for them” as he is spending another day on the WGA picket lines Monday. Additionally, Amazon Studios will start to send letters to those under overall and first-look deals Monday or Tuesday.

 

So far, Netflix has not suspended overall pacts, I hear. Word is that they, along with other streamers, are considering it, and may do it next week.

 

The suspension of overall deals comes as the major TV studios last week also informed writer/producers that they are expected to continue rendering producing services during the WGA strike. At a meeting Saturday, showrunners shot back, saying that “there is no non-writing aspect” to what they do.

 

The language in the overall deal suspension letters varies slightly — from “suspended engagement” (NBCUniversal) to “suspended services” (Warner Bros., Disney, CBS Studios) as all notify showrunners that the compensation they receive under their term deals have been suspended effective May 2 when WGA went on strike following the expiration of the guild’s contract with the studios as the two sides could not reach a new agreement.

 

Some, like Disney and NBCUniversal, do not go into detail while others, like WBTV and CBS Studios, specify areas that are being impacted, including overhead/executive pay and business expense reinforcement, access to office space, etc. Disney notes that all pay is suspended “except as specified in the Agreement.”

 

[CAHokie]

On 5/8/2023 at 4:31 PM, Bosco685 said:

 

 

 I had a feeling this was going to happen..

[Bosco685]

Christopher Nolan and Jonathan Nolan