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"Breakthrough" claims in WGA strike

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Is there finally light at the end of the tunnel? A breakthrough in contract talks is understood to have been reached between Hollywood studios and the WGA.

At this stage neither party has put out a statement, but there is speculation it could lead to a tentative deal as early as next week.

The two sides breached the gap on Friday on compensation for projects distributed via the Internet, said a source requesting anonymity.

Although work remains to be done on elements of the agreement, prospects for a deal appeared solid, the person said. The tentative agreement would have to be approved by a majority of guild members.

Even United Hollywood, a website formed by striking writers sounds hopeful of an end. But it errs on the side of caution with solidarity firmly intact, “The only reason we’ve gotten as far as we have in the negotiations is because the pressure has stayed on. If we let up on that pressure, even a little, it could affect the draft language of the agreement.”

Source: AAP

5 Responses

  1. With South Park in paticular, they air 24 shows over the years period (usually with a few month hiatus in the middle of the season), SoutParkStudios.com have always said that the shows are literally created week to week. South Park is a very topical show, for instance in season Nine they made a joke about Steve Irwins death two weeks after it happened.
    As for not having anything written, of course shows like Lost, Heroes etc etc have there entire season mapped out in advance, writers are consulted on set to make adjustments to the script and studios put in the writing requests also but the overall story is always in place. Its not like they make it up as they go along and just end up in some random place by the end of the season.
    Its like saying if there was a Musicians strike that no one would pick up a guitar and write a few songs in the mean time, an artist creates, wether they are in production or not. If a writer suddenly wakes up in the middle of the night with a new concept for a show or script idea, they dont say to themselves “oh yeah, I’m on strike I cant write anything down”, they always write.
    There’s no reason to write “on the quite” the strike just doesn’t enable them to be put in production and released. And theres no reason for a weeks “pretend writing” simply for the same reasons.
    You have to remember that the writers aren’t hugely wealthy people, they have families to feed and the people who work on said productions also have families to support, once the strike is over I think you will see productions resuming in a matter of weeks not months and I’m guessing there dying to get back to work just as everyone else who is affected is also.

  2. Sadly, the 2007-8 US TV season is dead, buried and over. Even those who optimistically thought they could do a few more episodes if the strike ended quickly (like Bryan Fuller with Pushing Daisies) have now had to admit that there will be little chance of that happening.

    And they can’t just go back into production as soon as the strike ends – I mean, nothing’s written yet! (In reality I’m sure there are MANY scripts written on the quiet, but they’d have to wait at least a week for some pretend writing time before going into production with them 🙂

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