Last Tuesday, three members from the Writers Guild of America came to UCLA to discuss some of the newer and less publicized issues as the writers strike marched forward into its eleventh week with no resolution in sight.
Sponsored by the WGA Foundation and Scripped.com, the “Screenwriters’ Perspectives on Writer Strike” event featured “Field of Dreams” screenwriter Phil Robinson, “Vertical Limit” screenwriter Robert King and “Family Guy” writer and co-executive producer David Goodman.
The event, which was not sponsored by UCLA, was held at the Anderson School of Management.
Besides shedding new light on the strike’s main demands, which include increased residuals from DVD sales and residuals from new media, the guests brought new light to other important demands, including those of animated feature writers and reality television writers, who are not covered by the guild.
“One of the things that we’re asking is that feature animation writers be covered the same way live-action feature writers are covered,” Robinson said.
“Also, we want to cover reality television. Reality television, despite what (studios) want you to think, is all written. We have thousands of writers from reality TV who want to be covered by us, but the companies won’t negotiate that,” he added.
The trio answered questions from members of the UCLA Anderson Entertainment Management Association and Entrepreneurs Association, as well as from Massachusetts Institute of Technology M.B.A. students looking to enter the entertainment industry.
One of the first issues touched on was the interim agreements between the WGA and independent production companies, such as the agreement that allowed David Letterman and Craig Ferguson to return to late night with their writing staffs.
“Companies have said we can’t make a deal and that our proposals are unreasonable. We now have a bunch of companies that have struck deals with us, so we’re proving the lies of those charges,” Robinson said at the event.
Last week, film companies such as The Weinstein Company and United Artists also signed interim agreements.
Besides the increasing number of interim agreements and the cancellation of the Golden Globes ceremony, the kickoff of the Directors Guild of America negotiations marked a new chapter in the strike, considering the similarity between past studio contracts with the WGA and with the directors’ guild.
The effect of the directors’ guilds negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which were scheduled to begin Jan. 7 but didn’t actually start until Jan. 12, on the writers’ strike is still unclear, but the WGA issued a statement Friday supporting the directors in their endeavor.
Robinson, a member of the WGA negotiating committee, voiced a similar sentiment in relating the struggles for increased residuals with the other guilds in Hollywood.
“If they can succeed in breaking us, it has a domino effect. If (writers) get nothing in new media, then the directors get nothing and the actors get nothing. Companies will save, over decades, tens of billions of dollars,” said Robinson. “For the future of all the unions in this town, we have to get jurisdiction over new media.”
The studios and major entertainment companies may be starting to feel the heat not only with the start of awards seasons for films, but also with the onset of the television pilot season.
“It adversely affects the pilot season for next year because this is the time of year that the networks pick up their pilots and scripts to production,” said Goodman. “If the strike goes on much longer, that pilot season will go away, so there could be a long term effect on television.”
No matter how big the effect may be, it seems the end is still far from near.
“Anyone who’s predicting when the strike is going to end is just guessing. It could end tomorrow, it could end in six months or a year,” said Robinson.