Hollywood writers strike after studios fail to negotiate low pay, AI use

The Writers Guild of America, representing thousands of TV and movie writers, is on strike after six weeks of failed negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP). Negotiations ended Monday night without a deal before WGA leadership called for a strike. Earlier in April 97.8% of WGA members voted yes in a strike authorization vote.

Without writers, production of TV and movies in development is likely to stop. Nightly talk shows like The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, The Tonight Show starring Jimmy FallonAnd Jimmy KimmelLive! goes offline without writers. Deadline reported reruns are played instead of new episodes.

The companies represented by AMPTP — Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Disney, Discovery-Warner, NBC Universal, Paramount and Sony — have “created a gig economy within a unionized workforce,” WGA said in a press release. “They have closed the door to their workforce and opened the door to writing as a completely freelance profession. Such a deal could never be considered by this membership.

WGA has released a document outlining its proposals and AMPTP’s responses regarding an increase in wages and residuals, stable writers’ rooms, improved health coverage, and regulation of the use of artificial intelligence. Preliminary agreements were reached on several proposals, but AMPTP rejected others, refusing to comment on some key points, such as weekly pay, retention of writers’ rooms, viewer-based streaming residuals and AI regulation, according to the WGA.

You can read the full document below.

Image: Writers Guild of America West

“We have proposals that would prevent the studios from eliminating the writer’s room; they refused to talk about it, comedian Adam Conover wrote on Twitter. “We have proposals to protect screenwriters from free work, which *COSTS THEM NOTHING TO IMPLEMENT*: they turned them down and offered an ‘educational meeting’.”

He continued: “We proposed that comedy/variety and daytime writers on streaming receive the same pay and protections as on TV. Instead they offered us a minimum that would apply to virtually no shows on the air, oh and they want to start paying you per day too.

The AMPTP said it presented a “comprehensive package proposal” that included “generous increases in writers’ compensation and improvements in streaming residuals.” The ‘main bottlenecks’ are ‘mandatory personnel’ and ‘term of employment’ AMPTP said in its press release. These both have to do with the increased reliance on ‘mini-rooms’, which are miniaturized writers’ rooms – two or three writers helping a showrunner write a script at a lower rate, often for a show is lit green. It’s a practice that makes writing jobs more precarious and lowers wages overall, writers say. The WGA’s current proposal calls for a minimum of six writers in pre-greenlight rooms, with a minimum for post-greenlight writers’ rooms. In terms of length of employment, pre-greenlight rooms would give writers at least 10 weeks of continuous work, with different minimums, again, for post-greenlight rooms.

WGA and AMPTP negotiate new contracts approximately every three years. The groups last reached an agreement in 2017, shortly after the old contract expired; a strike was averted. WGA writers last went on strike in 2007; that strike lasted 100 days. We can estimate the impact of the strike based on history, but it won’t be quite the same this time. The advent of streaming means platforms like Netflix couch series are ahead of the game, meaning we won’t necessarily see an impact there for a while. However, the strike will have a personal and economic impact on the individual writers and other production staff who are now out of work. Nobody wants a strike, but writers still think it’s important to push back the studio’s leadership.

While WGA and AMPTP work toward a resolution, AMPTP will begin preparations for negotiations with actors represented by the Screen Actors Guild – American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, and directors with the Directors Guild of America; both contracts expire in June.

Ed. remark: Polygon is part of the Vox Media Union, represented by the Writers Guild of America – East. Our contract is separate from that of TV and film writers.