Strikes in Hollywood: Screenwriters and studios reach an agreement

In the USA, the striking Hollywood authors have reached an agreement in their dispute with the film industry, which could mean the end of the industry’s longest labor dispute in more than 30 years. The Writes Guild of America announced this without giving any further details. In a message to the union members it is simply stated that an agreement has been reached in principle on all points of dispute and that the relevant document is now being formulated. According to the Los Angeles Times, pay is set to increase and new rules around the use of AI have been agreed upon. Now the focus is likely to shift to the actors and actresses who are also on strike, for whom there is still no end in sight.

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No return to normality yet

The strike began in May, when 11,500 screenwriters in the USA stopped working after negotiations between the studios and the authors that began in March failed. Your union has called for, among other things, better pay and a minimum size for writing teams as well as a minimum length of employment for series scriptwriters. In addition, more should be paid for series on streaming services such as Netflix. It should also be stipulated that material from AI systems such as ChatGPT may not be rewritten. The WGA is now talking about an “extraordinary agreement”, with substantial improvements for members in all areas.

As the Los Angeles Times further explains, the negotiated agreement should now be put in writing; on Tuesday, the two parts of the union – for the west and east of the USA – could vote on whether approval is recommended. Then the members themselves are asked. Authors should only resume work if the union recommends this. Until then, protests at the picket lines have been suspended – union members are being asked to join the actors. It will be a while before Hollywood gets back to business as usual. According to the newspaper, the strike may have already caused economic damage to California alone amounting to five billion US dollars.

With the agreement, an end to the fiercely fought dispute is now in sight. The US magazine Deadline quoted an anonymous manager as saying that the writers’ strike would be held off until union members lost their apartments or houses. Another described it as a “cruel but necessary evil.” The labor dispute was devastating for the industry; over 50 films were put on hold whose production had already started or was due to start in the foreseeable future – including the sequel to the Tom Cruise action flick “Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning”, which was split into two parts. Deadpool 3 and Gladiator 2.

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