Hollywood’s writers go on strike 5/28/23, 1:27 PM

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United States | Lights, camera, industrial action

Hollywood’s writers go
on strike
Making movies and television isn’t all it’s cracked up to
be

Apr 28th 2023 | LOS ANGELES Share

Editor’s note (May 2nd 2023): On May 1st the Writers

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Hollywood’s writers go on strike 5/28/23, 1:27 PM

Editor’s note (May 2nd 2023): On May 1st the Writers

Guild of America chose to go ahead with the strike after late

talks with American !lm studios broke down.

O ne hundred years ago, the hills above Los Angeles

got a facelift. A giant sign was erected to advertise a
new property development. Its 13 letters, each 43 feet tall,
spelled “hollywoodland” (“land” was later dropped).
The modern movie business was forming at around the
same time, as Warner Brothers consolidated power and
Walt Disney left Kansas City for Los Angeles. Yet instead
of celebrating its centenary, Hollywood faces upheaval:
screenwriters are striking for the !rst time in 15 years.

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0:04 5:15

Every three years the Alliance of Motion Picture and

Television Producers, the trade group for the studios,
negotiates a new contract with the Writers Guild of
America (wga), the writers’ union. This year talks soured
as studios and writers grappled with how streaming has
upended their business models and working conditions.
The wga voted to strike if negotiations failed. On May
2nd, hours after their contract expired, they downed
pens. Writers wearing matching blue t-shirts and
carrying signs with snarky messages (“My pronouns are
pay/me”) picketed in front of studios across la and in
New York City.

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Hollywood’s writers go on strike 5/28/23, 1:27 PM

Writers’ complaints boil down to two issues. First is the

amount of work on o"er. There were nearly 600 original
scripted television shows in 2022, more than ever before.
But in the age of streaming, more content does not
necessarily mean more work. Many writers’ rooms—
where scribes try to wrangle ideas into scripts—last for
fewer weeks and employ fewer writers than in the past.
Inspiring particular ire are “mini rooms”, where a few
writers map out several episodes before a show even gets
the green light. “I do think it’s a cost-cutting measure,”
says Sean Collins-Smith, a writer on nbc’s cop drama
“Chicago pd”.

The second problem lies with “residuals”—what a writer

gets paid each time an episode or !lm they worked on is
rebroadcast. In the Net#ix era, !lms and tv shows can be
rebroadcast on demand. Writers argue that the industry
has not yet found a way to equitably adjust their payment
system to account for this huge change.

A writers’ strike is felt across Hollywood. When shows

stop production, camera people, costume designers and
others are also out of work. Late-night talk shows are the
!rst to go dark. The Milken Institute, a think-tank in
Santa Monica, reckons the previous strike in 2007 and
2008 cost California’s economy $2.1bn.

Striking screenwriters may inspire less sympathy than

factory workers who down tools, or even the cash-
strapped graduate students who went on strike across
California last year. “There’s a notion out there of the
spoiled, entitled, glitz-and-glam lifestyle of Hollywood
writers,” admits Mr Collins-Smith. But “I know people
who, when they got out of their last room, immediately
started driving for Uber.”

Los Angeles is the fourth-most-expensive city in the

world, according to an annual cost-of-living survey from
eiu, The Economist’s sister company. “You come to la for
the land of opportunity,” says Jake Lawler, a 24-year-old
writer who moonlights as a stuntman to make ends
meet. “But the peace-of-mind tax is way higher than
anywhere else in the country.”
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Hollywood’s writers go on strike 5/28/23, 1:27 PM

anywhere else in the country.”

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For studios, the question is whether the !lm industry can

make money. Before covid-19 shuttered cinemas,
theatrical releases accounted for about 45% of a studio’s
revenues for a big-budget !lm, according to fti
Consulting. Americans are again going to the movies, but
not in pre-pandemic numbers. The streamers are also
hunting for pro!ts. Net#ix laid o" hundreds of workers
in 2022 after it lost subscribers for the !rst time since
2011, and the !rm recently said it would restructure its
!lm department to focus on fewer, better #icks. “There’s
going to be a precipitous drop in investments in movies
in general, because it’s just hard to make a pro!t,” warns
Howard Suber, who taught !lm at the University of
California, Los Angeles for 45 years.

In some ways, the writers’ strike and the business-model

woes are what Hollywood is accustomed to. “Every !ve to
ten years there’s some kind of crisis, going back to the
introduction of sound,” says Mr Suber with a chuckle.
Hollywood is celebrating its century the only way it
knows how: chaotically. 7

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This article appeared in the United States section of the print edition under the
headline "Lights, camera, industrial action"

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