Listen to me on TV CONFIDENTIAL:
As always, the further we go back in Hollywood history, the more that fact and legend become intertwined. It's hard to say where the truth really lies.
February 12, 2008
Writers’
strike ends after 100 days. Hollywood’s
longest work stoppage since 1988 ends on this day in 2008, when members of the
Writers Guild of America (WGA) vote by a margin of more than 90 percent to go
back to work after a walkout that began the previous November 5.
The writers’ strike began during the negotiation of
the WGA’s latest contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television
Producers (AMPTP), which represents over 300 production companies. Negotiations
stalled after WGA members demanded a share of the revenues generated by movies,
television shows and other works distributed on the Internet and viewed on
computers, cell phones and other new-media devices.
Heavily covered by the press, the walkout proved to be
much more damaging to the entertainment industry than expected. More than 60 TV
shows had to be shut down, causing a drop in ratings and the loss of tens of
millions of dollars in ad revenue for the networks. By the end, the strike was
estimated to have cost the local L.A. economy more than $3 billion, taking into
account lost wages for writers and crew members, lost business for service
industries such as catering and equipment rental and reduced consumer spending.
For the duration of the strike, TV viewers at home were forced to go without
new episodes of their favorite shows, as networks dealt with the shutdown of
production by loading the schedule with reruns and increased amounts of reality
programming (such as a revamped version of the 1990s hit American Gladiators).
Negotiators reached a tentative agreement on February
8, and both the East Coast and West Coast branches of the WGA ratified the deal
on February 10. Two days later, the writers themselves approved the truce, and
a new contract with the AMPTP was signed February 25. Based in part on a deal
signed the previous month between production companies and the Directors Guild
of America, the new contract gave WGA members residual payments for programs
streamed online (at a much higher rate than that paid for DVDs) and formalized
union jurisdiction over programming created for the Web. Writers would be paid
for shows streamed on advertising-supported Web sites and WGA members hired to
write original content for the Web would be covered under a union contract.
Though labor experts and WGA supporters heralded the
outcome as an important victory for the striking writers, the contract included
several key concessions. Studios could hire non-union writers to work on
low-budget Internet shows, for example, and no residuals would be paid to
writers for repeat shows viewed online within a few weeks after the original
show aired on television. The strike also failed to win the union jurisdiction
over the ever-more-important realms of reality programming and animation.
Still, in an email message to East and West Coast
writers groups quoted in the New York Times, Patric M. Verrone,
president of the West Coast guild, and Michael Winship, his East Coast
counterpart, stressed the positive ending to the 2007-08 writers’ strike: “Much
has been achieved, and while this agreement is neither perfect nor perhaps all
that we deserve for the countless hours of hard work and sacrifice, our strike
has been a success.”
To
quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".
quote the Bicentennial Minute, "And that's the way it was".
Stay Tuned
Tony Figueroa
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