Since May 2 at 12:01 a.m., Hollywood has been in turmoil with the exact people who keep them in business. However, a tentative agreement is in the works, and a functioning Hollywood is on the horizon. The historic Writers Guild Strike has come to an end while the Screen Actors Guild strike continues.
Writers put down the pen
The Writers Guild of America (WGA) is a union group of 11,500 screenwriters. The guild makes up the “writer’s rooms” of every major film and television company in Hollywood. Thus, a writer’s strike halts all non-indie films and TV shows from continuing, because there are no scripts. A forced hiatus became necessary ever since the boom in the streaming industry.
With the decreased amount of episodes per season in relation to cable television, the writers are experiencing less residual pay. A writer for the ABC hit show “Abbott Elementary,” Brittani Nichols, explains that if the show is rerun on ABC, she’d make $13,500, but if it is on streaming, she makes merely $700. Therefore, the companies that produce these shows and films are able to hoard more of the revenue with the use of streaming platforms. This, in turn, turned into a major catalyst for the writer’s strike.
SAG-AFTRA on strike
SAG-AFTRA explicitly states via their website that they were striking due to “multibillion-dollar media conglomerates [being]rewarded for exploiting workers.” Performers were not being paid in accordance with inflation. To explain, the price of living is increasing, but their wages are not.
With the increasing capabilities of artificial intelligence (AI), production companies are looking to use the likeness of performers without their consent. There also would be no monetary compensation for the performers with this AI use.
Coming to terms
The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) negotiations are still under wraps. The terms of the agreement from the writer’s strike will likely serve as a blueprint for the compromise to come for the screen actors’ strike.
Where do we draw the picket line?
The prequel of The Hunger Games franchise, “The Ballad of the Songbirds and Snakes,” is set to be one of the biggest films of the year. SAG-AFTRA has issued an interim agreement for the actors of the film to promote the movie. However, this is a double-edged sword. The guild is, in essence, breaking their own strike, because a major film is releasing. Deadline states that Lionsgate, the production company, is not in affiliation with who they are striking against. Thus, there could be an exception. Nonetheless, the principle of the interim agreement remains questioned.
With this being the first major motion picture promotion since “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer,” it will be interesting to see how this affects the strike and the industry.
As of Nov. 9, SAG-AFTRA is officially off strike. Hollywood and those who employ it are finally in agreement.
