Somto BisinaHollywood writers have threatened to strike across the industry in the US, which could bring TV and film production to a halt. The Writers Guild of America (WGA) could call a work stoppage if it fails to reach an agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) by 11.59pm ET on Monday, potentially resulting in the first WGA strike in 15 years.
The writers have suffered financially during the streaming TV boom, receiving smaller residual payments and working longer hours for less pay.
This has led to half of TV series writers working at minimum salary levels, compared to one-third in the 2013-14 season. Median pay for scribes at the higher writer/producer level has fallen 4% over the last decade, according to WGA statistics.
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One of the key demands of the WGA is the implementation of safeguards to prevent studios from using artificial intelligence (AI) to generate new scripts from previous work by writers. The writers also want to ensure that they are not asked to rewrite draft scripts created by AI.
The negotiations are taking place against a difficult economic backdrop for the entertainment industry, which is under pressure from Wall Street to make streaming services profitable after investing billions of dollars in content to attract subscribers.
The AMPTP, which represents Comcast Corp, Disney, Warner Bros Discovery, Netflix, and hundreds of production companies, has said it is committed to reaching a fair agreement.
If a strike is called, late-night shows, such as The Tonight Show With Jimmy Fallon and Saturday Night Live, which use teams of writers to craft topical jokes, are expected to immediately stop production. Soap operas and other daytime shows, such as The View, will probably be disrupted.
News programs would not be affected because those writers are members of a different union. Further ahead, the strike could lead to a delay in the autumn TV season, as writing for those shows normally starts in May or June.
If the work stoppage becomes protracted, networks will increasingly fill their programming line-ups with unscripted reality shows, news magazines, and reruns.
The last WGA strike in 2007 and 2008 lasted 100 days, causing significant disruption to the entertainment industry and the California economy, which reportedly lost an estimated $2.1bn.
The strike tipped California’s already fragile economy into a recession, according to the Milken Institute, a thinktank. While studios do not want further disruption after the Covid-19 pandemic halted production worldwide for months, budgets are tight, and a new era of fiscal austerity has dawned in Hollywood, with studios laying off thousands of employees and curtailing spending on content.
“The writers have legitimate issues here,” said one talent agent. “But the studios and the producers have very legitimate issues also. Their stock prices are down. They’ve overspent on content. They need to show profits to their shareholders.”
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