What a day, what a day.
Lots of stuff happening.
First off, we had the Martin Luther King commemorative picket at Paramount. It appeared to me to be well attended. Lots of familiar faces, from the past decade or so of my career and from the picket lines over the past two-plus months.
Seemed to me like it went well. Don't know if it made it onto the local news but my guess would be probably not.
Then came the really big development -- word from WGA headquarters that we were formally removing our demands for jurisdiction over Reality TV and animation before our negotiators begin their informal talks with various CEOs from the agenda-setting conglomerates of the AMPTP.
Pretty big, huh?
Hard to call our leadership "radical" when they throw a bone that size to the opposition before even re-entering into active negotiations.
Seems like the road is being paved to a settlement -- at least on our side of said road.
Then came my least favorite development of the day -- and the one that I have been obsessing over since I read it a little less than twelve hours ago: the op-ed column in the LA Times written by Patrick Goldstein, in which Patrick Goldstein compares our president, Patric Verrone, to Yasir Arafat.
I shit you not, my friends.
You gotta' laugh... don't ya?
I'll tell you what makes this even more obsessive for me. Patrick Goldstein and I are dads at the same school. I've said a few dozen words to him in friendly passing over the course of the last three or fours years. So I've been thinking about what to say the next time I see him up at school...
I came up with this:
-- but before I write it I feel like it's necessary for me to do something which I've never done here on this blog, though it was not an omission by design.
Oddly enough, although I reference my credits and my colleagues, I've never once mentioned my own name. I don't know exactly why. I think at the start I felt like the strike was not the place to try and grab a spotlight or become a center of attention. Of course, the truth is my little blog here has no spotlight and is no center of attention, so I shouldn't have worried about it.
Anyway, for the record, my name is Ethan Reiff.
Now, regarding Patrick Goldstein...
What I will tell him is that he blew it. Missed a real good opportunity. He would have been much better off comparing Patric Verrone to Adolph Hitler.
Speaking for myself, I believe you can kind of make the argument that Patric does slightly resemble Hitler, in a strictly physical sense -- he has kind of the same straight and stringy black hair and does favor conservative attire. At least then -- with a Hitler reference -- there would have been SOMETHING IN THE ENTIRE EXPANSE OF THE UNIVERSE for Patrick Goldstein to fall back on in defense of his pathetically sorry excuse for a newspaper column.
No matter what you think of the WGA or the current strike, how can you believe comparing Patric Verrone to Yasir Arafat is an appropriate thing to do?
Yasir Arafat?!?!?!?!
I was pissed at the column before it reached that surreal "Arafat" point. Two or three times Patrick Goldstein -- addressing himself to the leadership of the WGA -- said something along the lines of: "It's time for you to return to the negotiating table."
You know, if Patrick Goldstein believes that us refusing to publicly back off from the six items listed in the ultimatum the AMPTP presented back on December 7th made it impossible for the AMPTP to return to the negotiating table and was foolish and unreasonable on our parts, he's entitled to think that. Hell, for all I know he may even be right. But he is not entitled to lie.
The WGA NEVER LEFT THE NEGOTIATING TABLE.
Why is it so difficult for so many highly-educated, sophisticated and well-informed members of the press to get that through their heads?
Again, if Patrick Goldstein believes we were wrong to refuse to give up on a bunch of stuff that the AMPTP wanted us to give up on in exchange for their return to the negotiating table, why can't he just say so? Why does he have to push it over the edge into what is undisputed untruth?
I gotta tell you though, I don't think it hurts our cause at all.
Not. At. All.
Because now, as before, only one thing matters on the WGA side of this dispute: solidarity. Unity. Sticking together.
No, that doesn't mean we all need to agree about everything. No that doesn't mean we all need to love our leaders. And no, that doesn't even mean we all need to hate Patrick Goldstein.
It just means we need to keep picketing until our very reasonable Negotiating Committee informs us they have come back with an offer for a new contract with the Writers Guild.
As I've said before, I didn't want to go out on strike. As I've said before, I was surprised and disappointed when a deal much like the one the DGA just got for themselves wasn't offered to us just before our own contract ran out.
At that time I would have been the first member in the meeting room to get on my feet and state the case for taking such a deal -- a deal that was not even close to what we were asking for but still a lot better than nothing. A deal that, most importantly of all, would enable us to get at least half of one of our feet through the door of internet profit participation.
That would have been enough for me.
If Patric and all our other leaders from the PLO, Al-Qaeda, HAMAS, North Korea, the Warsaw Pact, Imperial Japan, Fascist Italy and the good old Third Reich say it's enough, then it will be enough for me now as well.
But if the Overlords of Darkness to whom we have pledged our unholy fealty say that in order for evil to triumph our barbarous brotherhood must keep holding out, that all we extremist partisans must keep on picketing a while longer... then that is what I will do.
Ironically enough, one of the items included in our leadership's e-mail update earlier today was a polite request for the membership to please remain calm, cool and collected when speaking with the press, in light of what an extremely sensitive time it is for negotiations right now.
I thought that was very smart and very appropriate.
If only the AMPTP had sent a similar e-mail to their bitches.
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Monday, January 21, 2008
Strike Day 79 (4 A.D.)
There were some developments today.
Only one will be discussed here -- in a shamelessly self-promotional way.
My friend Charlie Craig (I'm dropping his name so often around here it's as if he's taking over this blog!) and his fellow Executive Producer on "Eureka" Thania St. John have been running a site for writers, both professional and amateur, to discuss what it is that makes them write.
Today's entry was from my partner and me.
SO CHECK IT OUT AT:
Why We Write
Or just slip your cursor over to the right, where that site has been linked for the past few weeks.
It was fun for my partner and I to get a chance to write something without being scabs.
I do this blog alone but it's a very different animal. Don't get me wrong -- I enjoy it and value it more than I might have expected but it's very different nonetheless.
My partner and I are hoping to see Charlie tomorrow morning over at Paramount, amongst the hundreds of WGA members who will be gathering for the Martin Luther King event.
Then we're going to have lunch with our favorite Line Producer, who supports the WGA about a hundred-and-ten percent, which -- especially considering how level-headed and intelligent she is -- is always nice to hear. I think it kind of sucks that so many people refer to the other side of this confrontation as "The Producers."
My partner and I are producers. The woman we will have lunch with tomorrow is a masterful producer. The people in charge of the other side in this strike are not producers. That's not a criticism, just an observation. I couldn't do what they do for a living any more than they could do my job as a producer. But it does kind of annoy me when people call them by that name.
Word is that tomorrow the AMPTP is coming back to sit down with out Negotiating Committee, which is a good thing.
It doesn't mean the strike is going to end any time soon but it does mean the process required in order for the strike to come to an end whenever it finally does -- which the other side had put on hold -- has resumed.
I know it sucks for all us WGA members to keep reading about how wonderful the DGA deal is and how the DGA got it because they are mature adults who know how to "negotiate."
But think how much worse it would have sucked if we had accepted what the AMPTP had to offer us a little less than three months ago -- which was profoundly less on the New Media front than the DGA just got for themselves.
It borders on the surreal, how little is being said in the mainstream media about the obvious connection between our strike and the gains made in the DGA's new contract. I know some of us are dismissing those gains as too little and too inapplicable to our own needs -- and to some extent they may well be right -- but that's not the point. GAINS WERE MADE. Taking nothing away from the DGA's own leadership and negotiating team, how any thinking person with their eyes open could fail to connect those gains to our strike is patently absurd.
But guess what?
It doesn't matter.
Sure, it matters to the contemporary record -- it impacts what the average uninvolved reader may think about the current labor dispute in Hollywood -- but it doesn't matter to us or the strike.
Not unless we allow it to.
Not unless we either (A) actually start to believe that lie of omission or (B) let the current wave of anti-WGA leadership spin swallow us up.
Either way -- choice (A) or (B) -- leads to drowning.
SO DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE.
Keep your spirits up.
They don't have to be sky-high, just high enough to get you out on the picket line as often as the rest of your life's routine allows for -- which is hopefully at least 3 hours a day, 4 days a week.
But if not, then you won't get grief from me -- so long as you come out and carry a picket sign as often as you can manage on a regular basis.
Of course, if you do any of the various more sophisticated stuff at WGA headquarters, like loading and unloading the vans or making tons of phone-calls, that counts just the same -- because no matter what, I REFUSE TO BE DIVISIVE ON THIS BLOG!
Hah-hah-hah -- just a touch of strike humor.
A very slight touch. Never said I was a comedy writer.
ON TO PARAMOUNT...
Only one will be discussed here -- in a shamelessly self-promotional way.
My friend Charlie Craig (I'm dropping his name so often around here it's as if he's taking over this blog!) and his fellow Executive Producer on "Eureka" Thania St. John have been running a site for writers, both professional and amateur, to discuss what it is that makes them write.
Today's entry was from my partner and me.
SO CHECK IT OUT AT:
Why We Write
Or just slip your cursor over to the right, where that site has been linked for the past few weeks.
It was fun for my partner and I to get a chance to write something without being scabs.
I do this blog alone but it's a very different animal. Don't get me wrong -- I enjoy it and value it more than I might have expected but it's very different nonetheless.
My partner and I are hoping to see Charlie tomorrow morning over at Paramount, amongst the hundreds of WGA members who will be gathering for the Martin Luther King event.
Then we're going to have lunch with our favorite Line Producer, who supports the WGA about a hundred-and-ten percent, which -- especially considering how level-headed and intelligent she is -- is always nice to hear. I think it kind of sucks that so many people refer to the other side of this confrontation as "The Producers."
My partner and I are producers. The woman we will have lunch with tomorrow is a masterful producer. The people in charge of the other side in this strike are not producers. That's not a criticism, just an observation. I couldn't do what they do for a living any more than they could do my job as a producer. But it does kind of annoy me when people call them by that name.
Word is that tomorrow the AMPTP is coming back to sit down with out Negotiating Committee, which is a good thing.
It doesn't mean the strike is going to end any time soon but it does mean the process required in order for the strike to come to an end whenever it finally does -- which the other side had put on hold -- has resumed.
I know it sucks for all us WGA members to keep reading about how wonderful the DGA deal is and how the DGA got it because they are mature adults who know how to "negotiate."
But think how much worse it would have sucked if we had accepted what the AMPTP had to offer us a little less than three months ago -- which was profoundly less on the New Media front than the DGA just got for themselves.
It borders on the surreal, how little is being said in the mainstream media about the obvious connection between our strike and the gains made in the DGA's new contract. I know some of us are dismissing those gains as too little and too inapplicable to our own needs -- and to some extent they may well be right -- but that's not the point. GAINS WERE MADE. Taking nothing away from the DGA's own leadership and negotiating team, how any thinking person with their eyes open could fail to connect those gains to our strike is patently absurd.
But guess what?
It doesn't matter.
Sure, it matters to the contemporary record -- it impacts what the average uninvolved reader may think about the current labor dispute in Hollywood -- but it doesn't matter to us or the strike.
Not unless we allow it to.
Not unless we either (A) actually start to believe that lie of omission or (B) let the current wave of anti-WGA leadership spin swallow us up.
Either way -- choice (A) or (B) -- leads to drowning.
SO DON'T BELIEVE THE HYPE.
Keep your spirits up.
They don't have to be sky-high, just high enough to get you out on the picket line as often as the rest of your life's routine allows for -- which is hopefully at least 3 hours a day, 4 days a week.
But if not, then you won't get grief from me -- so long as you come out and carry a picket sign as often as you can manage on a regular basis.
Of course, if you do any of the various more sophisticated stuff at WGA headquarters, like loading and unloading the vans or making tons of phone-calls, that counts just the same -- because no matter what, I REFUSE TO BE DIVISIVE ON THIS BLOG!
Hah-hah-hah -- just a touch of strike humor.
A very slight touch. Never said I was a comedy writer.
ON TO PARAMOUNT...
Sunday, January 20, 2008
Strike Day 77-78 (Day 2-3 A.D.)
Well, this Sunday turned out to be quite a day indeed.
First came the football games -- both of which involved 2 teams I really like. It's true -- my four favorite teams made it into the conference championships and faced off against each other, so it was kind of a win-win situation for me. Still, despite despising the Red Sox like a good native New Yorker, I have been a big fan of the New England Patriots since junior high school.
The first game was good but the Giants' overtime win over Green Bay was simply awesome. I'm a Green Bay fan mostly because I'm a bit of a reactionary and traditionalist and the Packers are pretty much it in terms of tough, old time football. I wore a Green Bay jersey when I played with the same bunch of guys for more than ten years in Manhattan and Brooklyn. And if you're a football fan and over thirty you've gotta love Brett Favre, for his longevity if nothing else.
A great day for football.
Then came the big strike-related development.
Now, this is kind of a switch for me, since I'm the guy who's always ranting AGAINST reading tea-leaves, finding hidden messages and/or divining the future.
I'm the one who keeps repeating: it's all very simple. Stick to the program -- which means come out and picket every day or as close to every day as you can manage and leave the negotiating to the Negotiating Committee.
Well, I'm still saying all of that -- but tonight I can't help but say a little something which I have to admit IS like reading tea-leaves, finding a hidden message and/or divining the future.
Maybe I'll turn out to be wrong or maybe not -- but here goes...
Earlier today I read an e-mail that got posted on Mysecondstrike.com, the strike-related blog of a friend of mine, Charlie Craig -- the showrunner of Sci-Fi channel's 1-hr drama "EUREKA." There's a link to reach it at the top right of this page.
A friend of his had sent the e-mail to him and then he checked to make sure it was cool to post it on his blog, got the go-ahead and put it up.
The e-mail was about the informal talks held over the weekend by members of our Negotiating Committee and some of the CEOs of the agenda-setting conglomerates that run the AMPTP.
The message was that those informal talks had gone wonderfully well and a WGA/AMPTP deal was close at hand and --
(this is where the tea-leaves start gathering in the form of a recognizable message at the bottom of the cup)
-- it turns out that those who are really to blame for this whole dang strike thing dragging on for so long are -- TA-DUM-TA-DUM...
NOT the chief executives of FOX, Paramount, Disney, Sony, Warner Bros., CBS, MGM or NBC Universal but rather Nick Counter and Carol Lombardini, numbers one and two over at the AMPTP offices in Encino.
Funny thing is it turns out that all this time, the bosses over at the 8 mega-corporations (well, MGM and even CBS probably don't qualify to be called such but they have no one but themselves to blame for the company they keep) have really, REALLY wanted to settle this thing like reasonable, decent men -- but have been kept from doing so by the evil, malicious, self-serving Nick Counter who cares about nothing other than his own EGO and PERSONAL AGENDA.
(In fact, turns out that Peter Chernin -- the big boss over at Fox -- says all he wants is for the strike to be over because it has been the worst experience of his entire career...)
Hmmmm.
Very interesting.
Now, maybe I'm nuts but this looks to me like the start of the script for our post-strike reality.
Of course, "Reality Shows" aren't scripted, are they?
Hah-hah, please don't get me wrong -- I'm not some "radical" out to unionize "Reality" or anything like that.
No, I'm just a simple fellow who has kind of a hard time believing that Nick Counter and Carol Lombardini could somehow trick or force or seduce (though I admit I've never seen a picture of Ms. Lombardini, so maybe I'm being presumptuous on that one) or cajole or torture or in any other way influence the handful of men who reign supreme over the world of film and television to do ANYTHING THEY THEMSELVES DID NOT WANT TO DO.
Nothing. Not a single, blessed -- or cursed -- solitary thing.
The AMPTP is an agent, a manager, a lawyer. An advocate and representative.
Whose job is to accomplish their client's objective. And whilst doing so, provide cover for their client when what their client wants done may piss off the other party to the deal.
So... maybe this is not just the end of the beginning but the beginning of the end.
Maybe the AMPTP will give us just enough more than they gave the DGA to enable us to make a deal we can live with without falling out amongst ourselves -- and proceed to hang Nick Counter and his sidekick Carol Lombardini out to dry as the twisted individuals who were REALLY AND TRULY responsible for the awful 2007-'08 writers strike.
Straw-man and woman to be burned for sins committed in the name of the media conglomerates they represent -- the conglomerates who, as it turned out, never even wanted things to go the way they did.
If that's how it goes, I'll be happy to gain the opportunity to go back to work ASAP -- so long as I'm not required to actually BELIEVE that's how it went.
Now I will dump the tea-leaves in the trash, put the cup in the dishwasher and go back to picketing like before.
Have a good Martin Luther King Day and I'll see you on the holiday picket line at Paramount on Tuesday...
First came the football games -- both of which involved 2 teams I really like. It's true -- my four favorite teams made it into the conference championships and faced off against each other, so it was kind of a win-win situation for me. Still, despite despising the Red Sox like a good native New Yorker, I have been a big fan of the New England Patriots since junior high school.
The first game was good but the Giants' overtime win over Green Bay was simply awesome. I'm a Green Bay fan mostly because I'm a bit of a reactionary and traditionalist and the Packers are pretty much it in terms of tough, old time football. I wore a Green Bay jersey when I played with the same bunch of guys for more than ten years in Manhattan and Brooklyn. And if you're a football fan and over thirty you've gotta love Brett Favre, for his longevity if nothing else.
A great day for football.
Then came the big strike-related development.
Now, this is kind of a switch for me, since I'm the guy who's always ranting AGAINST reading tea-leaves, finding hidden messages and/or divining the future.
I'm the one who keeps repeating: it's all very simple. Stick to the program -- which means come out and picket every day or as close to every day as you can manage and leave the negotiating to the Negotiating Committee.
Well, I'm still saying all of that -- but tonight I can't help but say a little something which I have to admit IS like reading tea-leaves, finding a hidden message and/or divining the future.
Maybe I'll turn out to be wrong or maybe not -- but here goes...
Earlier today I read an e-mail that got posted on Mysecondstrike.com, the strike-related blog of a friend of mine, Charlie Craig -- the showrunner of Sci-Fi channel's 1-hr drama "EUREKA." There's a link to reach it at the top right of this page.
A friend of his had sent the e-mail to him and then he checked to make sure it was cool to post it on his blog, got the go-ahead and put it up.
The e-mail was about the informal talks held over the weekend by members of our Negotiating Committee and some of the CEOs of the agenda-setting conglomerates that run the AMPTP.
The message was that those informal talks had gone wonderfully well and a WGA/AMPTP deal was close at hand and --
(this is where the tea-leaves start gathering in the form of a recognizable message at the bottom of the cup)
-- it turns out that those who are really to blame for this whole dang strike thing dragging on for so long are -- TA-DUM-TA-DUM...
NOT the chief executives of FOX, Paramount, Disney, Sony, Warner Bros., CBS, MGM or NBC Universal but rather Nick Counter and Carol Lombardini, numbers one and two over at the AMPTP offices in Encino.
Funny thing is it turns out that all this time, the bosses over at the 8 mega-corporations (well, MGM and even CBS probably don't qualify to be called such but they have no one but themselves to blame for the company they keep) have really, REALLY wanted to settle this thing like reasonable, decent men -- but have been kept from doing so by the evil, malicious, self-serving Nick Counter who cares about nothing other than his own EGO and PERSONAL AGENDA.
(In fact, turns out that Peter Chernin -- the big boss over at Fox -- says all he wants is for the strike to be over because it has been the worst experience of his entire career...)
Hmmmm.
Very interesting.
Now, maybe I'm nuts but this looks to me like the start of the script for our post-strike reality.
Of course, "Reality Shows" aren't scripted, are they?
Hah-hah, please don't get me wrong -- I'm not some "radical" out to unionize "Reality" or anything like that.
No, I'm just a simple fellow who has kind of a hard time believing that Nick Counter and Carol Lombardini could somehow trick or force or seduce (though I admit I've never seen a picture of Ms. Lombardini, so maybe I'm being presumptuous on that one) or cajole or torture or in any other way influence the handful of men who reign supreme over the world of film and television to do ANYTHING THEY THEMSELVES DID NOT WANT TO DO.
Nothing. Not a single, blessed -- or cursed -- solitary thing.
The AMPTP is an agent, a manager, a lawyer. An advocate and representative.
Whose job is to accomplish their client's objective. And whilst doing so, provide cover for their client when what their client wants done may piss off the other party to the deal.
So... maybe this is not just the end of the beginning but the beginning of the end.
Maybe the AMPTP will give us just enough more than they gave the DGA to enable us to make a deal we can live with without falling out amongst ourselves -- and proceed to hang Nick Counter and his sidekick Carol Lombardini out to dry as the twisted individuals who were REALLY AND TRULY responsible for the awful 2007-'08 writers strike.
Straw-man and woman to be burned for sins committed in the name of the media conglomerates they represent -- the conglomerates who, as it turned out, never even wanted things to go the way they did.
If that's how it goes, I'll be happy to gain the opportunity to go back to work ASAP -- so long as I'm not required to actually BELIEVE that's how it went.
Now I will dump the tea-leaves in the trash, put the cup in the dishwasher and go back to picketing like before.
Have a good Martin Luther King Day and I'll see you on the holiday picket line at Paramount on Tuesday...
Friday, January 18, 2008
Strike Day 76 - the A.D. era begins...
Today was the first day of a new era in the history of our strike.
I have lifted the historical term "Anno Domine" (Latin for "Year of our Lord") and dubbed this new era "A.D." -- for After the Directors deal.
So welcome to the new era.
So far, it seems a lot like the old era -- in that the mainstream press is filled to overflowing with exactly the kind of coverage I would dream of if I was a top executive at a big media conglomerate helping to set the agenda for the AMPTP.
The papers are filled with articles explaining how the incredible deal the DGA got sets we in the WGA up to collapse, to fall apart, to turn against our leadership and against each other -- if our leadership does not instantly sign on the AMPTP's dotted line to accept the DGA deal lock, stock and however many smoking barrels may turn out to be included.
Man, I wish they would just list the name of ONE F*#@ING WRITER WHO TELLS THEM THAT in the actual articles themselves -- don't you? And no, I don't wish that because I want to do anything inappropriate to the people who said these things, I wish that because then I might actually believe what I was reading was true.
Then again, I suppose we're better off if it's not true, so maybe I should just hope they keep leaving all the names out.
The only names of WGA members I have seen talking about how fantastic and wonderful the DGA deal is and what a disaster it will be for the union if we don't sign on to it ASAP are Dick Wolf and John Wells.
Those two guys are worth more than a hundred-million dollars each.
Both those guys have multiple TV juggernaut shows on the air -- and every day one of those shows isn't being produced hurts their bottom line.
Of course, every day my own TV pilots aren't being produced and every day the movie my partner and I are supposed to be writing for Universal isn't being written is hurting our bottom line as well -- and the same holds true for every working writer in the country.
At least John Wells, after pretty much jumping up and down with joy over the detailed terms of the DGA deal, said the only reason the DGA got a deal that good was that the WGA was conducting a successful strike. For that I nod my head to him. Also, what he had to say was in an e-mail that got posted, with his permission, on a writer's web-site -- not at a press conference.
It's kind of funny actually, in a bitter and twisted way. The mega-successful TV writer-producer worth more than 100-million dollars who said something good about the WGA, said it to a limited audience, while the other mega-successful TV writer-producer worth more than 100-million dollars had this to say to the press:
If you are a writer who desperately wants to end the strike and return to work you would probably know that the way to make that happen is by convincing your fellow striking writers and the leadership of our guild that the DGA deal is a good template for a writers deal and we should move as fast as possible to settle with the AMPTP.
Now please tell me: do you further that goal by publicly predicting dissension in the ranks and sowing discord?
We are where we are now. No matter how much you might be against the strike -- philosophically, politically, personally, strategically -- do you really think that weakening your guild's position in the eyes of the OPPOSITION -- in the eyes of the opposing side in the current confrontation in which we are now engaged -- will help settle the strike under the best terms possible for you?
I certainly don't.
But of course, I don't run my own television empire either.
I wish I did. I'm jealous of those guys. But even if I had three shows on the air and was losing the opportunity to earn millions more every week, I can't believe I would say something like that -- something whose only absolutely predictable effect will be to give aid and comfort to the AMPTP while our guild remains out on strike against them.
I know Dick Wolf was against the strike more than a year ago. Just like I was. This has nothing to do with going on strike. This has to do with ending the strike on the best possible terms for us -- the Writers Guild of America.
The New York Times had an article about the impact of the DGA deal on the writers strike. It was shockingly inaccurate, at least from where I'm sitting or standing and picketing and listening to my various fellow guild members. One of the highlights was this paragraph:
Now I see what the strike has been about all along, us writers finding a better father figure for ourselves. Thank you, New York Times -- paper of record -- for pointing that out to me.
Later in the article the writer says the DGA decided now was not the time to "make a stand" regarding New Media -- but in the following sentence he goes on to say:
Funny but he never spends one syllable trying to figure out WHERE THOSE GAINS IN THE REALM OF DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION CAME FROM!
Like, say... the WGA's ongoing strike?
I suppose it's pointless to get riled over these things. They will write what they will write. At least it's not as bad as what Variety writes.
But please tell me -- what kind of big-time newspaper reporter can't connect the dots between one union's ongoing strike which is having a devastating impact on an industry and a brother union gaining serious concessions from contract negotiations conducted simultaneously with said strike? There wasn't even a passing mention of how one situation MIGHT have effected the other.
And I swear, I am not looking for "pro-writer" articles in the paper! Just an impartial presentation of the facts.
Ah, well...
Let's just wait and listen when the Negotiating Committee finishes crunching the numbers and tells us what they think of the DGA deal and how it applies to us.
After that, if you want us to take the DGA deal as is, great. Tell that to the leadership and try to convince all the rest of us.
If you want us to look for at least one major gain -- like shutting the "free window" for internet distribution -- great. Tell that to the leadership and try to convince all the rest of us.
If you want us to demand everything we ever asked for and hold out until the actors come to join us on July 1st in hopes that we will get it all... well, then the truth is I think you're crazy but for now I'll still say: great. Tell that to the leadership and try to convince all the rest of us.
And the same holds true for any opinion anywhere in between.
Just do me a favor and please don't hold a press conference where you announce that if things don't go exactly the way you want them to, the sky is going to fall.
I have lifted the historical term "Anno Domine" (Latin for "Year of our Lord") and dubbed this new era "A.D." -- for After the Directors deal.
So welcome to the new era.
So far, it seems a lot like the old era -- in that the mainstream press is filled to overflowing with exactly the kind of coverage I would dream of if I was a top executive at a big media conglomerate helping to set the agenda for the AMPTP.
The papers are filled with articles explaining how the incredible deal the DGA got sets we in the WGA up to collapse, to fall apart, to turn against our leadership and against each other -- if our leadership does not instantly sign on the AMPTP's dotted line to accept the DGA deal lock, stock and however many smoking barrels may turn out to be included.
Man, I wish they would just list the name of ONE F*#@ING WRITER WHO TELLS THEM THAT in the actual articles themselves -- don't you? And no, I don't wish that because I want to do anything inappropriate to the people who said these things, I wish that because then I might actually believe what I was reading was true.
Then again, I suppose we're better off if it's not true, so maybe I should just hope they keep leaving all the names out.
The only names of WGA members I have seen talking about how fantastic and wonderful the DGA deal is and what a disaster it will be for the union if we don't sign on to it ASAP are Dick Wolf and John Wells.
Those two guys are worth more than a hundred-million dollars each.
Both those guys have multiple TV juggernaut shows on the air -- and every day one of those shows isn't being produced hurts their bottom line.
Of course, every day my own TV pilots aren't being produced and every day the movie my partner and I are supposed to be writing for Universal isn't being written is hurting our bottom line as well -- and the same holds true for every working writer in the country.
At least John Wells, after pretty much jumping up and down with joy over the detailed terms of the DGA deal, said the only reason the DGA got a deal that good was that the WGA was conducting a successful strike. For that I nod my head to him. Also, what he had to say was in an e-mail that got posted, with his permission, on a writer's web-site -- not at a press conference.
It's kind of funny actually, in a bitter and twisted way. The mega-successful TV writer-producer worth more than 100-million dollars who said something good about the WGA, said it to a limited audience, while the other mega-successful TV writer-producer worth more than 100-million dollars had this to say to the press:
"If the WGA rejects the basic concepts of a DGA deal, there's going to be a great deal of dissatisfaction among the membership," Dick Wolf, creator and executive producer of the Law & Order franchise, told reporters. "The bottom line here is: this town should be back to work in three weeks."
If you are a writer who desperately wants to end the strike and return to work you would probably know that the way to make that happen is by convincing your fellow striking writers and the leadership of our guild that the DGA deal is a good template for a writers deal and we should move as fast as possible to settle with the AMPTP.
Now please tell me: do you further that goal by publicly predicting dissension in the ranks and sowing discord?
We are where we are now. No matter how much you might be against the strike -- philosophically, politically, personally, strategically -- do you really think that weakening your guild's position in the eyes of the OPPOSITION -- in the eyes of the opposing side in the current confrontation in which we are now engaged -- will help settle the strike under the best terms possible for you?
I certainly don't.
But of course, I don't run my own television empire either.
I wish I did. I'm jealous of those guys. But even if I had three shows on the air and was losing the opportunity to earn millions more every week, I can't believe I would say something like that -- something whose only absolutely predictable effect will be to give aid and comfort to the AMPTP while our guild remains out on strike against them.
I know Dick Wolf was against the strike more than a year ago. Just like I was. This has nothing to do with going on strike. This has to do with ending the strike on the best possible terms for us -- the Writers Guild of America.
The New York Times had an article about the impact of the DGA deal on the writers strike. It was shockingly inaccurate, at least from where I'm sitting or standing and picketing and listening to my various fellow guild members. One of the highlights was this paragraph:
Dennis Palumbo, a screenwriter-turned-psychologist whose practice includes a number of Hollywood writers, said guild members — many of whom have come to regard the companies as negative parental figures — appear to see Mr. Verrone and Mr. Young as friendlier alternatives. “Which parent do you go with, the big, bad parent that you know, or someone who’s presenting himself as an Alan Alda parent?” Mr. Palumbo said.
Now I see what the strike has been about all along, us writers finding a better father figure for ourselves. Thank you, New York Times -- paper of record -- for pointing that out to me.
Later in the article the writer says the DGA decided now was not the time to "make a stand" regarding New Media -- but in the following sentence he goes on to say:
In the meantime, however, they will receive for digital distribution roughly double the residuals rate that has been paid for decades when films and television shows are resold on videocassettes or DVDs, and for the first time be paid a reuse fee for advertising-supported programs streamed free on the Web.
Funny but he never spends one syllable trying to figure out WHERE THOSE GAINS IN THE REALM OF DIGITAL DISTRIBUTION CAME FROM!
Like, say... the WGA's ongoing strike?
I suppose it's pointless to get riled over these things. They will write what they will write. At least it's not as bad as what Variety writes.
But please tell me -- what kind of big-time newspaper reporter can't connect the dots between one union's ongoing strike which is having a devastating impact on an industry and a brother union gaining serious concessions from contract negotiations conducted simultaneously with said strike? There wasn't even a passing mention of how one situation MIGHT have effected the other.
And I swear, I am not looking for "pro-writer" articles in the paper! Just an impartial presentation of the facts.
Ah, well...
Let's just wait and listen when the Negotiating Committee finishes crunching the numbers and tells us what they think of the DGA deal and how it applies to us.
After that, if you want us to take the DGA deal as is, great. Tell that to the leadership and try to convince all the rest of us.
If you want us to look for at least one major gain -- like shutting the "free window" for internet distribution -- great. Tell that to the leadership and try to convince all the rest of us.
If you want us to demand everything we ever asked for and hold out until the actors come to join us on July 1st in hopes that we will get it all... well, then the truth is I think you're crazy but for now I'll still say: great. Tell that to the leadership and try to convince all the rest of us.
And the same holds true for any opinion anywhere in between.
Just do me a favor and please don't hold a press conference where you announce that if things don't go exactly the way you want them to, the sky is going to fall.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Strike Day 75 - DGA Deal Day
Well, many were expecting it from the moment the week began but it actually arrived today.
I was out on the picket line at the Avon Gate around Noon. The WGA's Vice President visited Warner Bros. today but had to take off for Paramount before making his way over to our little gate, so our local WGA professional came by to fill us in on the latest developments.
Foremost amongst these were the very strong indications that the DGA deal would be announced before the end of the day.
A few minutes after our WGA pro left for the main gate I got a call from a friend telling me that Variety had an article up online announcing that the DGA and AMPTP had completed a "tentative deal." This same Variety article went on to say that "moderates" in the WGA were hoping that they could convince the guild's leadership not to dismiss the DGA deal "out of hand."
Man, sometimes I don't know whether to laugh or cry over this stuff -- or just burn all the copies of Variety I have saved over the years because my partner and I got our pictures in them.
What WGA leader -- or WGA "radical" member -- has ever advocated dismissing a DGA deal "out of hand"?
Wouldn't it be better for even the most "radical" writer to LEARN ABOUT THE DEAL FIRST, before dismissing it or embracing it?
Anyhow, a few minutes after that call I got a call from a friend who's a news producer for ABC Nightly News in New York City, letting me know that the AP had put a story out over the wire that said the same thing as the Variety article. Then the first friend who had called e-mailed me a cheat-sheet from the internet with the high-points of the deal.
News does travel fast these days.
Well, now things will get a little more interesting. Maybe a lot more interesting.
First, the DGA membership has to decide whether or not to accept this new contract. My guess is it will not take long for them to do so.
Then we will see how things proceed with us. I saw an "open letter" from the heads of the big conglomerates to the WGA on the AMPTP website, reaching out to initiate "informal talks" which could lead back to the negotiating table. That's interesting.
Of course, the informal talks we engaged in with those fellas earlier led to us getting screwed in pretty brutal fashion. Does that mean we shouldn't accept the olive branch now? I don't know. I can see the arguments for and against. I will leave that one to the leadership and the Negotiating Committee.
I do know the one thing in the DGA deal that stood out to me as probably being too bitter a pill to swallow at this point is the continued use of an internet "WINDOW" during which material of any kind can be screened without having to pay any residual of any kind. The window in the DGA deal is 16 days.
That means for 16 days the companies will take new material and make it available to stream and/or download 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That's what I would do if I was them. After that maybe they'll just pull the material off the net, or leave it there, considering it will already have been streamed and/or downloaded to death by the audience.
Then there are the actual numbers. Right now it looks like a grand total of $1200.00 for a year's worth of use and reuse on the internet. Well, that's a lot more than the $250.00 they offered us but it's also a lot less than the $20,000.00 one-time residual for traditional TV. A lot less. But this strike isn't only about TV reruns, it's also about gaining jurisdiction over material written directly for "New Media" -- and the DGA got that in their deal, which is a good thing.
I guess the bottom line is... where exactly does our own bottom line lie? Where is the WGA's line in the sand?
Well, I suppose it will be wherever our Negotiating Committee determines it should be.
Right now I don't have a problem with that.
From the start of real negotiations in July, I believe our Negotiating Committee did a very reasonable job of attempting to negotiate a fair deal.
So let's all learn as much as we can about the details of the DGA deal and listen to what the Negotiating Committee has to say about it after they've done the same. By then, the DGA membership will most likely have signed off on their new contract and the question will be... how do we move forward towards our own renewed negotiations. Do we go back to the "informal talks" that didn't work out so good last time... or do we require a return to more "official" and "on the record" negotiations...?
There are two different sets of dynamics being put into motion here and now:
The first set involves our own membership, some of whom, for a variety of reasons, may want to instantly sign off on any deal -- no matter how bad it may be in the long run -- in order to get back to work ASAP.
Some others will come at it from the opposite side and refuse to agree to a contract that doesn't gain for us all or close to all of what we have been on strike for during the past two-and-a-half months.
Personally, I think the lion's share of the WGA membership will fall squarely in the middle.
They will not be ready to sign on to a bad deal, nor will they want to remain on strike for months and months to come if a reasonable deal -- albeit one that falls short of our entire list of demands -- is there for the taking. For this group the devil will be in the details.
I would count myself in this middle group.
But please don't refer to me as a "moderate writer" -- since "moderate writers" are the ones Variety keeps saying are doing all sorts of things that make absolutely NO F*#@ING SENSE!
I also think the WGA leadership should be counted in this group -- the reasonable, middle.
Perfect, no. reasonable, yes.
As I have said before, no one on the Negotiating Committee or the Executive Board or any of our attorneys, has ever said that any one thing on our list of demands was "off the table" or "not open to negotiation."
No one. Not Patric Verrone. Not David Young. No one.
The other side keeps trying to make it seem like we have. They receive unstinting aid in doing so from the film & TV trade publications in general and Variety in particular. But the fact remains we have not.
Yes, Patric Verrone told participants as a mass rally that "reality TV jurisdiction" would be in our next contract -- well, that's something he wants. That's something lots of guild members want -- and lots of currently non-union reality writers too.
But that isn't the same as telling the AMPTP it is something we refuse to negotiate over.
Don't buy into our side being "unreasonable" until they actually DO SOMETHING that is unreasonable.
So that's the first new dynamic -- how this development will affect our own members.
The second dynamic involves the Industry at-large. All those people who are not writers but who have been out of work because of the strike.
Once the DGA approves their new contract, the rest of the industry is going to become a Greek Chorus alternately pleading and demanding:
TAKE THEIR DEAL... TAKE THEIR DEAL... TAKE THEIR DEAL...
If the deal is good enough for the directors why isn't it good enough for you writers too? Are you better than the rest of us -- are you so special? If someone cuts you, do you not bleed? What makes you think you're so different from everyone else...?!
Of course, we know what makes us different. The fact that a hefty chunk of our membership relies much more heavily on RESIDUAL PAYMENTS to keep their heads above choppy economic waters. Our membership and the membership of SAG.
Still, the DGA has some -- albeit more limited than our own -- interest in residuals as well. And when you need to get into the arcane nitty-gritty details in order to defend your position to an audience... well, you're pretty much screwed in terms of winning them over to your side. It becomes a very difficult thing to do.
A lot of production people support the WGA and support this strike. One of them walked out of Warner Bros, passed me on the picket line today and said he supported us 100% and wanted us to keep fighting for the future -- even though he was getting laid-off tomorrow.
But some production people don't support us and are sick of the strike and angry at us.
That's just how it is.
My guess is the DGA deal will instantly swell the ranks of those non-writers in town who think this is all our fault.
I hate to tell you but this should not matter to us.
We can't let it matter to us.
Contrary to what some say, I don't think this strike is a popularity contest. Whether the public is for us or against us matters much, much less than whether we are for ourselves and against splitting apart into cannibalistic factions.
So let's stick together the way we have been, read the nitty-gritty details of the DGA deal and listen to what our negotiators and our leaders and our lawyers have to say about it.
Stay calm. Have some more patience.
On the funny side, I found out I am quoted in a recent issue of the online journal "Socialist Worker."
The reporter was at the "Scene of the Crime" event outside AMPTP headquarters in Encino on the last big Strike day before the Holiday break. She was asking people about the strike and I talked to her for a while -- and then she began trying to recruit us for the Socialist Party.
Needless to say she didn't have much success -- at least with me or the couple of other writers who were speaking with her at the time.
But she wrote a pretty good, very straightforward article about the strike. If you want to check it out, here's the link:
Socialist Worker WGA strike article
As for all us WGA members -- Socialist and non-Socialist alike -- I reiterate:
Stay calm. Stay patient. Stay on the picket lines.
And please don't kid yourself or allow yourself to be convinced otherwise: were it not for hundreds and -- on occasion -- thousands of us WGA members walking back and forth on the sidewalks of Los Angeles with picket-signs in our hands for the past two-and-a-half months, the Directors Guild of America would not have the deal they do now. They'd have a deal, yes -- but it wouldn't be anywhere near as good.
Anyone who argues with you over that one is either a liar or a fool.
I was out on the picket line at the Avon Gate around Noon. The WGA's Vice President visited Warner Bros. today but had to take off for Paramount before making his way over to our little gate, so our local WGA professional came by to fill us in on the latest developments.
Foremost amongst these were the very strong indications that the DGA deal would be announced before the end of the day.
A few minutes after our WGA pro left for the main gate I got a call from a friend telling me that Variety had an article up online announcing that the DGA and AMPTP had completed a "tentative deal." This same Variety article went on to say that "moderates" in the WGA were hoping that they could convince the guild's leadership not to dismiss the DGA deal "out of hand."
Man, sometimes I don't know whether to laugh or cry over this stuff -- or just burn all the copies of Variety I have saved over the years because my partner and I got our pictures in them.
What WGA leader -- or WGA "radical" member -- has ever advocated dismissing a DGA deal "out of hand"?
Wouldn't it be better for even the most "radical" writer to LEARN ABOUT THE DEAL FIRST, before dismissing it or embracing it?
Anyhow, a few minutes after that call I got a call from a friend who's a news producer for ABC Nightly News in New York City, letting me know that the AP had put a story out over the wire that said the same thing as the Variety article. Then the first friend who had called e-mailed me a cheat-sheet from the internet with the high-points of the deal.
News does travel fast these days.
Well, now things will get a little more interesting. Maybe a lot more interesting.
First, the DGA membership has to decide whether or not to accept this new contract. My guess is it will not take long for them to do so.
Then we will see how things proceed with us. I saw an "open letter" from the heads of the big conglomerates to the WGA on the AMPTP website, reaching out to initiate "informal talks" which could lead back to the negotiating table. That's interesting.
Of course, the informal talks we engaged in with those fellas earlier led to us getting screwed in pretty brutal fashion. Does that mean we shouldn't accept the olive branch now? I don't know. I can see the arguments for and against. I will leave that one to the leadership and the Negotiating Committee.
I do know the one thing in the DGA deal that stood out to me as probably being too bitter a pill to swallow at this point is the continued use of an internet "WINDOW" during which material of any kind can be screened without having to pay any residual of any kind. The window in the DGA deal is 16 days.
That means for 16 days the companies will take new material and make it available to stream and/or download 24 hours a day, seven days a week. That's what I would do if I was them. After that maybe they'll just pull the material off the net, or leave it there, considering it will already have been streamed and/or downloaded to death by the audience.
Then there are the actual numbers. Right now it looks like a grand total of $1200.00 for a year's worth of use and reuse on the internet. Well, that's a lot more than the $250.00 they offered us but it's also a lot less than the $20,000.00 one-time residual for traditional TV. A lot less. But this strike isn't only about TV reruns, it's also about gaining jurisdiction over material written directly for "New Media" -- and the DGA got that in their deal, which is a good thing.
I guess the bottom line is... where exactly does our own bottom line lie? Where is the WGA's line in the sand?
Well, I suppose it will be wherever our Negotiating Committee determines it should be.
Right now I don't have a problem with that.
From the start of real negotiations in July, I believe our Negotiating Committee did a very reasonable job of attempting to negotiate a fair deal.
So let's all learn as much as we can about the details of the DGA deal and listen to what the Negotiating Committee has to say about it after they've done the same. By then, the DGA membership will most likely have signed off on their new contract and the question will be... how do we move forward towards our own renewed negotiations. Do we go back to the "informal talks" that didn't work out so good last time... or do we require a return to more "official" and "on the record" negotiations...?
There are two different sets of dynamics being put into motion here and now:
The first set involves our own membership, some of whom, for a variety of reasons, may want to instantly sign off on any deal -- no matter how bad it may be in the long run -- in order to get back to work ASAP.
Some others will come at it from the opposite side and refuse to agree to a contract that doesn't gain for us all or close to all of what we have been on strike for during the past two-and-a-half months.
Personally, I think the lion's share of the WGA membership will fall squarely in the middle.
They will not be ready to sign on to a bad deal, nor will they want to remain on strike for months and months to come if a reasonable deal -- albeit one that falls short of our entire list of demands -- is there for the taking. For this group the devil will be in the details.
I would count myself in this middle group.
But please don't refer to me as a "moderate writer" -- since "moderate writers" are the ones Variety keeps saying are doing all sorts of things that make absolutely NO F*#@ING SENSE!
I also think the WGA leadership should be counted in this group -- the reasonable, middle.
Perfect, no. reasonable, yes.
As I have said before, no one on the Negotiating Committee or the Executive Board or any of our attorneys, has ever said that any one thing on our list of demands was "off the table" or "not open to negotiation."
No one. Not Patric Verrone. Not David Young. No one.
The other side keeps trying to make it seem like we have. They receive unstinting aid in doing so from the film & TV trade publications in general and Variety in particular. But the fact remains we have not.
Yes, Patric Verrone told participants as a mass rally that "reality TV jurisdiction" would be in our next contract -- well, that's something he wants. That's something lots of guild members want -- and lots of currently non-union reality writers too.
But that isn't the same as telling the AMPTP it is something we refuse to negotiate over.
Don't buy into our side being "unreasonable" until they actually DO SOMETHING that is unreasonable.
So that's the first new dynamic -- how this development will affect our own members.
The second dynamic involves the Industry at-large. All those people who are not writers but who have been out of work because of the strike.
Once the DGA approves their new contract, the rest of the industry is going to become a Greek Chorus alternately pleading and demanding:
TAKE THEIR DEAL... TAKE THEIR DEAL... TAKE THEIR DEAL...
If the deal is good enough for the directors why isn't it good enough for you writers too? Are you better than the rest of us -- are you so special? If someone cuts you, do you not bleed? What makes you think you're so different from everyone else...?!
Of course, we know what makes us different. The fact that a hefty chunk of our membership relies much more heavily on RESIDUAL PAYMENTS to keep their heads above choppy economic waters. Our membership and the membership of SAG.
Still, the DGA has some -- albeit more limited than our own -- interest in residuals as well. And when you need to get into the arcane nitty-gritty details in order to defend your position to an audience... well, you're pretty much screwed in terms of winning them over to your side. It becomes a very difficult thing to do.
A lot of production people support the WGA and support this strike. One of them walked out of Warner Bros, passed me on the picket line today and said he supported us 100% and wanted us to keep fighting for the future -- even though he was getting laid-off tomorrow.
But some production people don't support us and are sick of the strike and angry at us.
That's just how it is.
My guess is the DGA deal will instantly swell the ranks of those non-writers in town who think this is all our fault.
I hate to tell you but this should not matter to us.
We can't let it matter to us.
Contrary to what some say, I don't think this strike is a popularity contest. Whether the public is for us or against us matters much, much less than whether we are for ourselves and against splitting apart into cannibalistic factions.
So let's stick together the way we have been, read the nitty-gritty details of the DGA deal and listen to what our negotiators and our leaders and our lawyers have to say about it.
Stay calm. Have some more patience.
On the funny side, I found out I am quoted in a recent issue of the online journal "Socialist Worker."
The reporter was at the "Scene of the Crime" event outside AMPTP headquarters in Encino on the last big Strike day before the Holiday break. She was asking people about the strike and I talked to her for a while -- and then she began trying to recruit us for the Socialist Party.
Needless to say she didn't have much success -- at least with me or the couple of other writers who were speaking with her at the time.
But she wrote a pretty good, very straightforward article about the strike. If you want to check it out, here's the link:
Socialist Worker WGA strike article
As for all us WGA members -- Socialist and non-Socialist alike -- I reiterate:
Stay calm. Stay patient. Stay on the picket lines.
And please don't kid yourself or allow yourself to be convinced otherwise: were it not for hundreds and -- on occasion -- thousands of us WGA members walking back and forth on the sidewalks of Los Angeles with picket-signs in our hands for the past two-and-a-half months, the Directors Guild of America would not have the deal they do now. They'd have a deal, yes -- but it wouldn't be anywhere near as good.
Anyone who argues with you over that one is either a liar or a fool.
Wednesday, January 16, 2008
Strike Day 74
Another beautiful blue-sky day in Southern California without a cloud in sight -- at least in the sky.
I did the 12:00 to 3:00pm shift on the picket line and to be honest for about an hour -- probably around 1:00 to 2:00 -- our WGA ranks were a little thin. It was just me and my "Strike Buddy." Then we were joined by a writer who was on her way to picket at NBC, noticed us as she was driving by and decided to park and join us, which was great. Then a couple of Writers Assistants showed up and we had suddenly more than doubled our numbers. The five of us kept picketing until the Guild van came by to pack up our signs and shut down the WGA presence at the Avon Gate around Three.
At one point while it was just the two of us, my strike buddy was off to the side getting a drink from the portable water cooler, leaving me picketing all by my lonesome, when a few Warners employees walked by and started giving me grief for being all alone. Basically they started heckling me. I heckled them back, as graciously as possible.
Another studio employee who was headed out crossed through the verbal exchange and added his own somewhat disparaging commentary, to which I replied with something like: "Well I'm just happy we live in a country where you and I can disagree about such things and still be able to live relatively happy lives," to which he replied: "You must be a fiction writer."
To which I then responded: "You mean because I said 'we can both live relatively happy lives'? Well, it's just my opinion but if you compare the average life here in the USA at the dawn of the 21st Century to the average life of anyone in the recorded history of mankind, I would stand by my claim that we count as 'relatively happy.'"
When my strike buddy came back to the line a minute later we both realized it had been a funny interlude but one which provided a serious lesson. The truth is, when you are marching back and forth with a picket sign in your hand ALL ALONE, you are an easy target. An easy target for derogatory humor on the one hand and an easy target to be made profoundly insignificant on the other. There is a big difference between one lone picketer and two picketers together -- and there is almost just as big a difference between two picketers and three. When you are alone, in any context on earth, you are an easy target for anyone who has half a notion to mess with you. When you are shoulder-to-shoulder with two other people, my guesstimate is that two-thirds of those who would have had the notion to mess with you -- even just verbally -- if you were all alone will not have that notion even cross their mind.
It takes much more motivation to mess with 3 people than to mess with one.
Now please don't get me wrong -- I'm not against intense, wide open debate, be it in the halls of the WGA or out on the picket line or pretty much anywhere else. In fact I have engaged in such debate many, many times throughout my life, everywhere from the streets of Brooklyn, New York to the streets of Shanghai, China -- but what I'm talking about wasn't "debate," it was heckling, plain and simple. And judging by my personal experience over the past two-and-a-half months, when there's more than one of us out there walking the line we simply don't get heckled.
So show up and walk the picket line, if for no other reason than to prevent your fellow guild members from being heckled!
I did the 12:00 to 3:00pm shift on the picket line and to be honest for about an hour -- probably around 1:00 to 2:00 -- our WGA ranks were a little thin. It was just me and my "Strike Buddy." Then we were joined by a writer who was on her way to picket at NBC, noticed us as she was driving by and decided to park and join us, which was great. Then a couple of Writers Assistants showed up and we had suddenly more than doubled our numbers. The five of us kept picketing until the Guild van came by to pack up our signs and shut down the WGA presence at the Avon Gate around Three.
At one point while it was just the two of us, my strike buddy was off to the side getting a drink from the portable water cooler, leaving me picketing all by my lonesome, when a few Warners employees walked by and started giving me grief for being all alone. Basically they started heckling me. I heckled them back, as graciously as possible.
Another studio employee who was headed out crossed through the verbal exchange and added his own somewhat disparaging commentary, to which I replied with something like: "Well I'm just happy we live in a country where you and I can disagree about such things and still be able to live relatively happy lives," to which he replied: "You must be a fiction writer."
To which I then responded: "You mean because I said 'we can both live relatively happy lives'? Well, it's just my opinion but if you compare the average life here in the USA at the dawn of the 21st Century to the average life of anyone in the recorded history of mankind, I would stand by my claim that we count as 'relatively happy.'"
When my strike buddy came back to the line a minute later we both realized it had been a funny interlude but one which provided a serious lesson. The truth is, when you are marching back and forth with a picket sign in your hand ALL ALONE, you are an easy target. An easy target for derogatory humor on the one hand and an easy target to be made profoundly insignificant on the other. There is a big difference between one lone picketer and two picketers together -- and there is almost just as big a difference between two picketers and three. When you are alone, in any context on earth, you are an easy target for anyone who has half a notion to mess with you. When you are shoulder-to-shoulder with two other people, my guesstimate is that two-thirds of those who would have had the notion to mess with you -- even just verbally -- if you were all alone will not have that notion even cross their mind.
It takes much more motivation to mess with 3 people than to mess with one.
Now please don't get me wrong -- I'm not against intense, wide open debate, be it in the halls of the WGA or out on the picket line or pretty much anywhere else. In fact I have engaged in such debate many, many times throughout my life, everywhere from the streets of Brooklyn, New York to the streets of Shanghai, China -- but what I'm talking about wasn't "debate," it was heckling, plain and simple. And judging by my personal experience over the past two-and-a-half months, when there's more than one of us out there walking the line we simply don't get heckled.
So show up and walk the picket line, if for no other reason than to prevent your fellow guild members from being heckled!
Tuesday, January 15, 2008
Strike Day 73
Back to normal.
That's how I would describe today on the picket line at Warner Bros.
We had a decent turn-out, including a couple of game-show writers I'd never met before who had some great stories concerning everything from "Jeopardy" to "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire?" Those guys come from an entire world that I know absolutely nothing about except as a fan, so it was kind of cool asking them questions about how those shows work on the inside.
Talked to some tourists from Kansas who had no idea what the strike was about. I tried to explain it in my most simple terms: television is moving to internet delivery and movies are not far behind. The Writers Guild needs to make sure that when stuff we wrote is delivered to an audience over the internet whoever wrote it gets their little piece of the profit pie. I may be an idiot but to me that is all this is about. They wished us luck and said they were happy to be in Southern California waering t-shirts, instead of back home in Kansas, where it was 15 degrees today.
Last night a mom at my older daughter's kung-fu class said something kind of funny. Her husband works for Staples Center, overseeing video broadcasts for all the big sporting events there. She said: "At least they don't need writers" -- in order for him to be able to broadcast all those programs. She wasn't trying to be mean, just relieved at her husband's relative job-security.
"At least they don't need writers."
She's a very nice woman but I said something about getting her a job application for the AMPTP.
The dreaded "Force Majeure" has begun to take out deals at studios and networks across LA. We heard half-a-dozen people with deals at Warner Bros. TV had their contracts "terminated." Hasn't happened to my partner and I yet but it could happen at any time. The downside is very obvious -- when the strike comes to an end we would not go back to receiving a regular weekly paycheck. But there would be an upside as well. We would be free to peddle our television wares all over town, rather than to just one studio. Don't get me wrong -- in this case I don't want to be free. But if I find myself free, I will revel in my freedom. One way or another we will get another TV show on the air. Hopefully it will be with Warner Bros. Television.
In a way I sympathize with the TV executives who we do business with. At least we know we are on the side of truth, justice and the American way -- if you consider enabling the workers who create successful products to share in the profit those products generate to be the American way. At least we have SOMETHING to do -- even if it's just march up and down the sidewalk carrying a picket sign in our hands. What do those executives have to do -- sit in their offices sifting through stacks of old pilot scripts while they wait to find out on whose head(s) the next cost-cutting initiative is going to fall?
True, they're still getting paid and that does count for something. But personally, I wouldn't want to trade places with them. Even more so because they aren't really participants in the decision-making process that brought us to this point. Even though I didn't vote to authorize the strike, I was given the opportunity to vote. Every member of the union -- including John Ridley -- was invited to every meeting, where they were able to say what they thought and be heard by how ever many of their fellow guild members remained in the auditorium. At least we are part of our side's decision-making process, even if we don't agree with the decision that gets made. At least we get to vote. The executives on the other side -- except for a tiny handful of guys at the top of the agenda-setting conglomerates, none of whom to my knowledge reside full-time in the city of Los Angeles -- pretty much have no say at all in the matter.
Of course we all have to live with the consequences, no matter how much or how little we were able to participate in the processes that brought them on.
McCaine came in second behind Romney in Michigan, which I suppose means the Republican nomination is now just as up-for-grabs as the Democratic one is. And there was no announcement today of a DGA deal. But it is coming. I don't want to say something like "and with it will come the temptation to cut and run" because for all I know it may include what we need to get in order to back to work. I'm not counting on it but I'm not counting against it either.
I am simply going to wait and see. And I think it's fair and reasonable to suggest you do the same.
See you tomorrow on the picket line -- where maybe I'll get lucky and meet someone who can educate me about some other writing genre that's totally alien to me, like Daytime Drama...
That's how I would describe today on the picket line at Warner Bros.
We had a decent turn-out, including a couple of game-show writers I'd never met before who had some great stories concerning everything from "Jeopardy" to "Who Wants To Be a Millionaire?" Those guys come from an entire world that I know absolutely nothing about except as a fan, so it was kind of cool asking them questions about how those shows work on the inside.
Talked to some tourists from Kansas who had no idea what the strike was about. I tried to explain it in my most simple terms: television is moving to internet delivery and movies are not far behind. The Writers Guild needs to make sure that when stuff we wrote is delivered to an audience over the internet whoever wrote it gets their little piece of the profit pie. I may be an idiot but to me that is all this is about. They wished us luck and said they were happy to be in Southern California waering t-shirts, instead of back home in Kansas, where it was 15 degrees today.
Last night a mom at my older daughter's kung-fu class said something kind of funny. Her husband works for Staples Center, overseeing video broadcasts for all the big sporting events there. She said: "At least they don't need writers" -- in order for him to be able to broadcast all those programs. She wasn't trying to be mean, just relieved at her husband's relative job-security.
"At least they don't need writers."
She's a very nice woman but I said something about getting her a job application for the AMPTP.
The dreaded "Force Majeure" has begun to take out deals at studios and networks across LA. We heard half-a-dozen people with deals at Warner Bros. TV had their contracts "terminated." Hasn't happened to my partner and I yet but it could happen at any time. The downside is very obvious -- when the strike comes to an end we would not go back to receiving a regular weekly paycheck. But there would be an upside as well. We would be free to peddle our television wares all over town, rather than to just one studio. Don't get me wrong -- in this case I don't want to be free. But if I find myself free, I will revel in my freedom. One way or another we will get another TV show on the air. Hopefully it will be with Warner Bros. Television.
In a way I sympathize with the TV executives who we do business with. At least we know we are on the side of truth, justice and the American way -- if you consider enabling the workers who create successful products to share in the profit those products generate to be the American way. At least we have SOMETHING to do -- even if it's just march up and down the sidewalk carrying a picket sign in our hands. What do those executives have to do -- sit in their offices sifting through stacks of old pilot scripts while they wait to find out on whose head(s) the next cost-cutting initiative is going to fall?
True, they're still getting paid and that does count for something. But personally, I wouldn't want to trade places with them. Even more so because they aren't really participants in the decision-making process that brought us to this point. Even though I didn't vote to authorize the strike, I was given the opportunity to vote. Every member of the union -- including John Ridley -- was invited to every meeting, where they were able to say what they thought and be heard by how ever many of their fellow guild members remained in the auditorium. At least we are part of our side's decision-making process, even if we don't agree with the decision that gets made. At least we get to vote. The executives on the other side -- except for a tiny handful of guys at the top of the agenda-setting conglomerates, none of whom to my knowledge reside full-time in the city of Los Angeles -- pretty much have no say at all in the matter.
Of course we all have to live with the consequences, no matter how much or how little we were able to participate in the processes that brought them on.
McCaine came in second behind Romney in Michigan, which I suppose means the Republican nomination is now just as up-for-grabs as the Democratic one is. And there was no announcement today of a DGA deal. But it is coming. I don't want to say something like "and with it will come the temptation to cut and run" because for all I know it may include what we need to get in order to back to work. I'm not counting on it but I'm not counting against it either.
I am simply going to wait and see. And I think it's fair and reasonable to suggest you do the same.
See you tomorrow on the picket line -- where maybe I'll get lucky and meet someone who can educate me about some other writing genre that's totally alien to me, like Daytime Drama...
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