And the Writers Strike First
Filed under: Scripts, Newsstand, Politics
Though their contract isn't set to expire until October 31 of 2007, the WGA (Writers Guild of America) are downloading the word 'strike' onto their iPods and shoving it into the face of anyone who will listen, most notably the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers. While studios would like negotiations to begin between the two parties this January, the WGA doesn't like that idea and would rather postpone talks till September, leaving only two months before the end of the world as we know it. Wait, writers aren't that important, right? I mean, what's the worst that can happen? It's not like the entire industry will fumble about before being brought to its knees. Right?
This stalling technique is nothing new for the WGA; their current contract wasn't finalized until five months after the previous one expired -- and, with online streaming and movie downloading bombarding the industry, serving as yet another medium for which studios can use to screw writers, expect this one to go right down to the wire ... as per usual. What does this mean for film? Well, folks will begin stockpiling scripts as if they were canned food and production will kick into high gear -- followed by a "de facto strike" this summer, which will halt production on films unable to wrap things up by October 31.
Why won't the WGA just succumb and begin negotiations early to avoid all of these complications? Sure, it seems logical, but then they don't have the threat of a strike to throw on the bargaining table. Besides, the extra time will allow them to calculate just how many pennies they should expect to get their writers for this whole downloading/streaming stuff. In the end, we're the only ones who will suffer -- look for this battle to play itself out in the trades over the course of the next year. Hooray, we now have something besides Spider-Man 3 to look forward to!
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
11-29-2006 @ 1:02AM
Gary Bourgeault (bizofshowbiz.com) said...
While the good writers to me are the true foundation of successful films, I have a hard time empathizing with them here.
The truth is that there is no way that it will be known for years how the Internet will work with Hollywood. There are all sorts of things starting to be tried that will take a long time to see whether they will provide predictable streams of income.
I don't see what there is to try to negotiate, when there is no current model to negotiate about. It's like the writers are saying something is going to happen, so we want to make sure the unknown something is worked out to our advantage.
It doesn't make any sense as of now.
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12-11-2006 @ 10:05AM
John Contrubis said...
The argument that new technology or new formats can't be negotiated because they have not been proven as a successful revenue stream for the industry just doesn't jive with history.
The studios have historically gone to the bargaining table claiming that they can't negotiate on items such as VHS and DVD because those were items for which no business model existed and they were unproven streams of revenue. The studios then ask the writers (and others - directors and actors) to become risk participants so that those "new" items can succeed. Years ago, the Writers Guild, DGA and SAG took the bait with DVDs. They agreed to a LOW residual formula so that DVDs could succeed. The result was that once DVDs became successful, the studios argued that they couldn't increase the share in residuals to the writers, directors and actors. To this day, a writer only gets $.05 for every $16.99 DVD that is sold. Multiple writers get to split that nickle!
The same M.O. is at play now. The studios are again saying that there is no business model for new technology and new formats. The difference now is that they're not even offering a pittance to the writers (and others I'm sure) for the work they perform, which is directly related to the success of those things. As a negotiator, I am fully aware that a formula can always be created that provides contingencies so that as a "new" format becomes more successful, those that helped to create the success get a greater share of the revenue. That's more equitable than cutting out those people until several years later when the contract is open for renegotiation. As we've seen in the past, there's no guarantee that the studios would then agree to share revenue. You just can't count on the studios to do the right thing.
http://writersworld.wordpress.com/2006/12/05/writers-guild-vs-amptp/
http://writersworld.wordpress.com/2006/12/10/writers-guild-vs-abc-cbs/
http://writersworld.wordpress.com/2006/12/06/wga-and-iatse-at-odds-again/
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