Hollywood WGA writers on strike as pay talks fall apart

The Writers Guild of America, which represents thousands of television and film writers, is on strike after six weeks of unsuccessful negotiations with the Alliance of Film and Television Producers (AMPTP). Negotiations ended Monday night without an agreement before WGA management called a strike. Earlier in April, 97.8% of WGA members voted yes in a strike authorization vote.

Without writers, production will likely stall on television and films in development. Nightly talk shows like The Late Show with Stephen Colbert, The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy FallonAnd Jimmy Kimmel Live! will go offline without writers. Deadline reported reruns will air in place of new episodes.

Companies represented by AMPTP Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Disney, Discovery-Warner, NBC Universal, Paramount and Sony have created a gig economy within a union workforce, WGA said in a press release. They closed the door to their workforce and opened the door to writing as a fully independent profession. No such agreement could ever be contemplated by these members.

WGA has released a document outlining its proposals and AMPTP’s responses regarding increased salaries and residuals, stable writers’ rooms, better health coverage, and regulation of the use of artificial intelligence. Tentative agreements were reached on several proposals, but the AMPTP rejected others and refused to counter a number of key elements, such as the weekly salary, the preservation of writers’ rooms, streaming residuals based on viewership and AI regulation, according to the WGA.

You can read the full document below.

We have proposals that would prevent studios from eliminating the writers room; they refused to discuss it, comedian Adam Conover wrote on Twitter. We have proposals to protect screenwriters from free labor, which would have *COST THEM NOTHING TO IMPLEMENT*: they rejected them and proposed an educational meeting.

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

The AMPTP said it presented a comprehensive proposal that included generous increases to writers’ compensation as well as improvements to streaming residuals. Its main sticking points are mandatory staffing and length of employment, The AMPTP said in its statement. These are both related to the increased use of mini-rooms, which are writers’ rooms reduced to two or three writers who help a showrunner write a script at a lower pace, often Before one show was lit green. It’s a practice that makes writing jobs more precarious and lowers wages overall, the writers say. The current WGA proposal calls for a minimum of six writers in pre-greenlight rooms with a minimum for post-greenlight writers rooms as well. As for length of employment, pre-greenlight rooms would give writers at least 10 weeks of consecutive work, with other 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 editors last went on strike in 2007; this strike lasted 100 days. We can estimate the strike’s impact based on the story, but it won’t be quite the same this time around. The advent of streaming means platforms like Netflix bank series ahead of time, which means we won’t necessarily see an impact there for quite some time. However, the strike will have a personal and economic impact on individual screenwriters and other now unemployed production staff. No one wants a strike, but the writers nonetheless feel it’s important to push back against studio management.

As the WGA and AMPTP work toward a resolution, the AMPTP will begin preparing 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. note: Polygon is part of the Vox Media Union, represented by the Writers Guild of America – East. Our contract is separate from that of television and film scriptwriters.