[ While the methods of production and distribution have
transformed several times over, every industry-wide strike since 1950
has been about residuals. Residuals have historically been the most
hard-fought battles. Now there is streaming, and AI.]
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THE WRITERS’ STRIKE OPENS OLD WOUNDS  
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Kate Fortmueller
May 19, 2023
Los Angeles Review of Books
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_ While the methods of production and distribution have transformed
several times over, every industry-wide strike since 1950 has been
about residuals. Residuals have historically been the most hard-fought
battles. Now there is streaming, and AI. _

Rally at the Rock, New York City unions support the WGA, Tuesday, May
23, outside NBC Universal headquarters at 30 Rock, featuring speakers,
guests, musicians, actors, artists from New York's labor and
entertainment communities., Facebook post from Local 802, American
Federation of Musicians

 

SCREENWRITERS CRAFT suspense on the page, but few plot beats can match
the real world tension built every three years when the Writers Guild
of America’s Theatrical and Television Minimum Basic Agreement
[[link removed]] (MBA) comes up for
renewal. Hollywood unions and guilds negotiate several guild-specific
contracts in addition to the MBA, but the film and television deal
creates industry standards for working conditions, pay, residuals,
health, and pensions and can lead to an industry-wide shutdown if
talks stall. Months in advance of this deal lapsing, industry experts
begin to speculate: Will the writers strike? Will the Screen Actors
Guild–American Federation of Television and Radio Artists
(SAG-AFTRA)—or even the reluctant-to-strike Directors Guild of
America—follow suit? The WGA is known as the toughest negotiator and
the most likely of all Hollywood unions to strike, and the memory of
the work stoppage that spanned 100 days in 2007–08 and disrupted
innumerable television and feature projects surely lingers in some
studio executives’ minds.

Contract negotiations, much like film reboots, revive old villains and
fault lines of antagonism. Historically, studios craft the
setting, as they did this year,
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claiming they need to reduce production expenses by stagnating wages
and residuals. The Hollywood unions must then fight—sometimes by
going on strike—for percentage increases that build on their past
wins and losses. However, like the formulaic reboot, the outcome is
often foretold: both studios and workers ultimately want a healthy
profitable industry, so the conflict will be resolved and the
characters will live to fight another day. What makes the 2023 strike
different is the introduction of new players
(streaming-services-cum-media-producers) and conditions (changes to
writers rooms, employment terms, and distribution) that change the
tenor of negotiations, especially since both sides are pushing for
structural changes to how Hollywood does business.

While the methods of production and distribution have transformed
several times over, every industry-wide strike since 1950 has been
about residuals. These strikes have been led by WGA, SAG, and AFTRA;
writers are often the toughest negotiators, but the stars and the
large membership numbers make the actors unions (which merged in 2012)
formidable. Prior to 1950, labor action in Hollywood centered on
jurisdictional battles and working conditions. Famously, in 1945, one
of these internal disputes ended in a violent clash on the Warner
Bros. lot dubbed “Black Friday.”
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pre-1950 strikes, led by the workers who eventually consolidated into
the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees (IATSE),
largely differed because they focused on basic working conditions and
pay. But the arrival of television forced the unions and performers to
think about the commodity value of their work, which could now be
replayed in multiple television markets around the United States, in
perpetuity.

Residuals continue to be at the core of negotiations because they
offer a degree of income stability in a notoriously unstable
profession. Hollywood workers, whether they are writers, directors,
actors, cinematographers, or editors, frequently have periods of
unemployment between contract work. Before streaming disrupted the
structure of the television season, this period was typically during
the summer. Streaming services and their endless demand for content
have created new forms of precarity for workers under the guise of
more work opportunities. In 2022, there were 599 original scripted
television shows,
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the streaming boom has been one of the major contributors to this
television trend. For writers, the problem is that the production of
more shows does not equal more professional security. Audiences have
likely noticed television seasons growing shorter and streaming
platforms commissioning more limited series. What we have not been
privy to are the changes behind our screens: streamers have changed
the way writers rooms are assembled (hiring fewer writers) and altered
timelines for breaking stories (before they are “greenlit,” or
approved for production), and shorter seasons also give new writers
less time to learn the ropes and prepare for the next job. Everyone
from seasoned showrunners to newly staffed writers are experiencing
changes to the profession at every stage.

As Hollywood has transformed since the 1950s, workers and their unions
have contended with endemic insecurity. The arrival of television
coincided with the 1948 Supreme Court ruling in _United States v.
Paramount, Inc._, which, among other things, put a momentary end to
vertical integration in Hollywood by forcing the studios to divest
their theater chains. The ramifications of the _Paramount_ decision
were wide-ranging: from exhibition and distribution practices, such as
changing profitable practices like block-booking, which required
independent theaters to show duds if they wanted to book star-studded
titles, to zoning and clearance practices, which impacted how films
were geographically distributed. But perhaps most significantly, the
ruling forced all Hollywood workers—even the most famous writers,
actors, and directors—into freelance contracts, effectively ending
the studio system that had governed the town since the advent of
sound. During the studio era, many actors and other film workers were
kept under contract and paid weekly salaries. This model of
remuneration resembled other professional jobs that kept workers
consistently employed. Few were vocal about the fact that studios
could profit from the rerelease of films, likely because they were not
as concerned with gaps in employment.

The turn toward residuals as the primary bargaining concern was the
result of a significant change in distribution practices—and a
fundamental change in remuneration practices. Unlike film, which
relies on direct payments (or ticket sales), television is in the
business of selling audience attention to advertisers; new shows are
the most profitable, but reruns are also capable of generating ad
revenue. It was essential for writer, actor, and director unions to
find a way that workers _and _networks could continue to profit from
their creative works. Workers have spent over 70 years adapting to
these changes. Today, despite new and novel changes to distribution
and remuneration—streaming, shortening of theatrical windows,
shortening of television series—residuals continue to be a salient
issue for writers, actors, directors, and many crew members.

In the case of writers specifically, we might also be witnessing
lingering tensions from the strike-that-could-have-been in 2020. In
late 2019, rumors of the key demands peppered the trades. An emphasis
on “streaming residuals” hearkened back to the 2007 WGA strike,
and a familiar pattern of industry reporting emerged. Writing at the
time
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her magazine’s characteristically insider tone, _Deadline_’s
co-editor-in-chief noted: “I hear that TV studios have been banking
extra scripts for their ongoing series where they can.” Hoarding
scripts is one of the telltale signs that studios are concerned about
a strike. It means that the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television
Producers (AMPTP) is anticipating tough negotiations and needs to
prepare so that shows can continue to shoot while negotiations are
deadlocked and writers establish a picket line.

Unique to the 2020 negotiations was the fact that all writers fired
their agents in April 2019 in an industry-wide demonstration
concerning packaging, the controversial agency practice of selling a
preassembled team of writers, scripts, and key personnel to networks
and streaming services. Agents fulfill a different role than unions,
but they are supposed to represent their clients on the same side of
the bargaining table against producers and studios. The practice of
packaging effectively made agents partners with the very producers
they should have been negotiating against on behalf of clients.

Nothing went as planned in 2020. In the first few months of the
pandemic we experienced widespread lockdowns, layoffs, adventures in
hybrid work, and a new category of worker deemed “essential.”
Those working in scripted film and television went on indefinite
hiatus pending the development of COVID-19 safety protocols. The
buildup to the 2020 negotiations was all for naught, since the
pandemic shutdown eliminated the ability for workers to use their
strike power to stop production. Instead, workers were in a bit of a
holding pattern as studios sent films straight to streaming and
streamers and networks used the pandemic as an excuse to cancel shows.
Writers wrote and pitched virtually, but actors, directors, and crew
were at home, waiting, developing ideas and thinking about the pros
and cons of resuming work in an industry that was changing despite
labor’s immobility.

Post-pandemic labor agitation shows that Hollywood workers are willing
to push back on a range of dealmaking practices. The pandemic shifted
how Americans think about work. Workers across multiple sectors went
on strike throughout 2021, and two-thirds
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Americans went in search of new jobs after the 2020 pandemic closures
and layoffs. In Hollywood, the WGA won their battle over packaging,
top talent like Scarlett Johansson challenged studio decision-making
that sent blockbuster films straight to streaming, and 13 IATSE locals
(representing 60,000 members) authorized the union to strike if
necessary. Overall, Hollywood workers pushed back against studios,
networks, and producers who had lots of latitude to experiment with
different distribution strategies and innovate to save their quarterly
earnings reports.

But the contours of writers’ labor concerns remained consistent. In
2022, as in 2019, networks began hoarding scripts, and the trades have
been predicting a strike. Yet post-pandemic labor conditions and the
streaming media landscape have altered the tenor of Hollywood’s
labor conversation, and the pattern of demands, or the key terms for
negotiation, looks different from those of past standoffs.
Significantly, this will be the first time that the WGA faces the
tech-company streamers (Netflix, Amazon, and Apple) as members of the
AMPTP. The WGA was prepared: 98.4 percent of members approved
the pattern of demands
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97.85 percent of eligible members voted to authorize a strike
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advance of the contract’s expiration date.

Those numbers underline the resolve in the WGA’s response to
modifications to distribution and payment, but also a reaction to
significant changes in media, industry culture, and the work of
writing itself. As audience members, we are not always privy to
adjustments to workplace culture, but we do understand the changes to
how and what we watch. Viewers have witnessed the ease of films going
straight to streaming alongside the rise of shortened episodic
seasons, prestige miniseries, and variable episode lengths that are no
longer beholden to commercial breaks and prime-time programming
schedules. Film has become untethered from the theatrical release and
television is no longer packaged in a predictable number of episodes
or minutes, changes which are reflected in the ubiquity of the
amorphous and medium-agnostic term “content.” There is much to
critique about the streaming landscape, and professional and armchair
critics alike bemoan the “canceled-too-soon” or the prolonged
breaks between streaming seasons. Whether these changes to media
storytelling are good or bad, the conversation rarely considers the
consequences for the talent working under contracts and terms based on
models of release and distribution that are quickly becoming obsolete.

The WGA’s official pattern of demands
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many of the changes that have occurred as film and television
transformed into “content.” It breaks down its concerns into three
categories: Compensation and Residuals, Pension Plan and Health Fund,
and Professional Standards and Protection in the Employment of
Writers. In this round of negotiations, the writers have tried to
cover their bases with regard to compensation and residuals and
professional development as they try to address threats to the size
and job of the writers room, concerns related to shortened seasons and
low pay, and the looming threat of AI as a supplement or even
replacement for writers. Based on the AMPTP’s counters,
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is clear that they are prepared to play hardball and bank on the
strength of their content libraries to keep viewers subscribed while
the WGA shuts down production.

One way to comprehend Hollywood’s labor history is to split, as I
have done, its strike history into pre- and post-1950 eras. There is a
clear rationale for focusing on residuals as the central point of
contention. The issue of residuals is also one that labor scholars and
industry experts can understand because Hollywood has a rich history
of fighting for this bargaining right. However, for this round of
negotiations, it is important to consider _whom _the AMPTP now
represents. The unions have been less successful at the bargaining
table with the tech-companies-cum-Hollywood-powerhouses. The risk of
focusing on the history of residuals is that it creates a particular
narrative of worker concerns that centers the WGA by necessity. This
narrative also runs the risk of occluding labor actions that have
focused on health and safety concerns, which seem to be growing among
union members.

For example, SAG-AFTRA’s most recent strike, in which the guild
negotiated with 11 video game studios—an industry more closely
aligned with tech giants—was their longest in history. In 2014, when
SAG-AFTRA’s video game contract expired, the union went to the
bargaining table with three key issues: residuals based on the number
of game units sold, transparency in performance expectations and
hiring, and the risks associated with vocal strain, residuals and
vocal strain being essential issues that impact a video game voice
actor’s professional longevity. In October 2016, voice actors went
on strike. After 340 days, those actors had to compromise on many of
their most significant demands. As for the actual changes implemented,
the union achieved gains for worker profits while safety issues were
left unresolved: specifically, SAG-AFTRA made some progress with
respect to transparency and what the union has termed secondary
payments. Video game companies are now required to provide actors with
information about productions. There is also now a clear structure for
how actors can be paid for additional sessions. The union had to drop
the topic of residuals, and there were no clear decisions about how to
address vocal strain.

As negotiations for the WGA heat up and those with SAG-AFTRA and the
DGA begin, it is worth noting the bargaining points where unions are
allowed to make gains. Residuals for film and television have
historically been the most hard-fought battles, but as content becomes
more amorphous, producers have more to gain in the shift away from
legacy forms, leaving labor with much to lose.

_[KATE FORTMUELLER is an assistant professor at the University of
Georgia. She is the author of Below the Stars: How the Labor of
Working Actors and Extras Shapes the Media Production (2021)
and Hollywood Shutdown: Production, Distribution, and Exhibition in
the Time of COVID (2021).
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* Writers Guild of America
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* WGA
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* Writers Strike
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* Hollywood
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* Hollywood studios
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* Films
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* movies
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* television
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* residuals
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* streaming
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* New Technology
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* artificial intelligence
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* Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers
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