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Writers Strike: Six Weeks Later
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According to the AMPTP, the demands are unrealistic. The WGA is asking for money that doesn’t exist, is attempting to impose restrictions that are questionable, and is trying to exert control over individuals who have freely chosen against joining the union.
According to the WGA, the AMPTP demands are unfair, requiring writers to give up Fair Market Value and any proposal that uses a distributor’s gross as a basis for residuals. Additionally, forfeiting their Internet proposal altogether just to continue bargaining.
Back and forth it goes with no tangible outcome.
Says Martin Wade, CEO of Broadcaster.com: “It’s just about splitting up the pie. You narrow in on the contract so that when a piece of content is digitally exploited and the studio gets the revenue, they must share it. They must share it with the originators, whether it be a writer or a producer. What makes it difficult, of course, is that they don’t want to!”
That want and desire to settle is clearly lacking. After more than 24 bargaining sessions since July 16th, there appears no end in sight. As of last week, the AMPTP walked away from the negotiating table, making their position clear. Said Studio head, Nicholas J. Counter: “We are leaving. When you write us a letter saying you will take all these items (above) off the table, we will reschedule negotiations with you.”
Likewise, the WGA countered, with a response by John F. Bowman, chairman of the negotiating committee: “We reject the idea of an ultimatum. Although a number of items we have on the table are negotiable, we cannot be forced to bargain with ourselves. The AMPTP has many proposals on the table that are unacceptable to writers, but we have never delivered ultimatums.”
No matter which side sounds more convincing, common consensus in Hollywood is that a prolonged strike is not a good thing. Certainly, no one wants to be reminded of the six-month strike almost 20 years ago—the longest in history, commonly referred to as “the bloodbath of 1988.”
For one, it’s costing the industry roughly $21 million a day. Also, failure to resolve the situation with the writers will undoubtedly domino into an even bigger work stoppage, as the Directors Guild of America (DGA) and Screen Actors Guild (SAG) contracts are set to expire on June 30, 2008.
On a related note, the AMPTP recently engaged the DGA in negotiations with the hopes of coming to terms well before June 30th; however, many writer-directors have petitioned the DGA and asked that they not discuss any details until the WGA and AMPTP have come to better terms. At least, for a few more weeks.
But with the holidays approaching, it’s likely the strike will linger well into next yea, which is bad news for the 10,000-plus members of the WGA in addition to the many production workers who work behind the scenes on film projects.
How long into next year? How long can the writers, most of them living far below the average annual income of $230,000 (reported by the AMPTP publicity department), hold out without work? How long can Hollywood continue to lose millions and millions in revenue and advertising with no original material?
“My opinion is that the writers will cave,” says Honour. “In talking to people in the Writers Guild who are out of work and living paycheck to paycheck like lots of other people, I don’t think it’ll take too long.”
Optimistically, says Wade, “It’s imminently feasible [to settle]… I don’t know if I can put into the context of when, but if everybody goes back to work, everybody wins.” Only time will tell, of course. Whether this week, next week or next year, something’s gotta give.
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COMMENTS | POST A COMMENT 
- Comment by Luciana Polney on 12/25/07 at 8:43 am
Although not a member of the WGA, I as a writer/director presently working in documentary, (not a pitch), am supporting the strike not only because of the bread and butter issues involved, but because of the potential dangers to democracy that does not respect sacrifices a writer makes to craft words on a page. When in negotiation such work is often dismissed at any and all stages of a production as an impersonal piece of business, whether a blueprint for a film, the book of a play or for that matter when words manifest in song or poetry it is no less than intellectual genocide. Furthermore, as concerned as business is over costs of employment of union members, there seems to be a middle ground. Do writers earning an upper-end income pay enough to maintain their membership? Can low income writers of the WGA pay less in order to over their health insurance? Will producers generating hundreds of millions of dollars for their executive producing clients and/or corporate sponsors play fair with labor?
- Comment by ds on 4/02/08 at 8:54 am
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