Hollywood’s writers have spoken: They are prepared to strike if necessary.
In a record-setting vote that concluded on Monday, 97.85 percent of eligible members of the Writers Guild West and East voted to authorize a strike, while 2.15 percent voted against. A total of 9,218 writers participated in the vote, or nearly 79 percent of members eligible to take part. According to the guild, this level of participation and support is unprecedented for a strike authorization vote for the union.
These results do not ensure a work stoppage will happen, but instead give the union the option to strike if labor leaders decide one is necessary in ongoing negotiations with studios and streamers over a new contract.
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“Our membership has spoken. You have expressed your collective strength, solidarity, and the demand for meaningful change in overwhelming numbers,” the WGA negotiating committee said in a message to members on Monday. “Armed with this demonstration of unity and resolve, we will continue to work at the negotiating table to achieve a fair contract for all writers.”
Union leaders will almost certainly use the wide margin by which members supported the strike authorization as leverage in ongoing talks with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), which represents the film and TV production arms of companies like Disney, Netflix and Amazon.
Meanwhile, earlier on Monday, as the Writers Guild of America prepared to release the results of the vote, the AMPTP said in a statement that member support for a potential work stoppage was “inevitable.”
“A strike authorization vote has always been part of the WGA’s plan, announced before the parties even exchanged proposals. Its inevitable ratification should come as no surprise to anyone,” the AMPTP said in the Monday statement, prior to the results going public.
The AMPTP added that, while its goal is to reach a “fair and reasonable agreement,” a deal “is only possible if the Guild is committed to turning its focus to serious bargaining by engaging in full discussions of the issues with the Companies and searching for reasonable compromises.”
WGA members have been voting on whether to authorize a strike since April 11, with polls closing on Monday at noon. Guild leaders and prominent members including Everything Everywhere All at Once co-director Daniel Kwan, One Day at a Time producer Mike Royce and Tell Me Lies showrunner Meaghan Oppenheimer heavily encouraged members to vote “yes” after the referendum was announced in early April.
The WGA and AMPTP have been negotiating a three-year contract covering around 11,500 film and television writers at the latter’s Sherman Oaks headquarters since March 20. Information about the progress of discussions has been scant, as the parties have agreed not to speak publicly about the substance of those talks. However, in early April the WGA alleged that “the studios need to respond to the crisis writers face” in negotiations, while in Monday’s statement the AMPTP suggested that the union has not been fully committed to reaching a deal prior to its strike authorization vote.
The union is targeting, first and foremost, compensation for writers in this round of talks. Some of its strategies for raising overall pay for members include setting higher wage floors across the board, standardizing fees for streaming and theatrical films, expanding span protection (which shields writers being compensated per episode from working for long periods on short-order series), regulating mini rooms, and instituting a mandatory two “steps” (points of payment) for feature writers. The WGA is additionally pushing for minimum television writing staff sizes and a minimum number of weeks of employment, THR reported in February.
Artificial intelligence is also in the union’s crosshairs in this round of talks. Amid the rise of ChatGPT and other chatbots that produce written material, the guild has clarified that it will be advocating to prohibit AI-produced or AI-rewritten content from being covered under the contract. Banning companies from assigning writers adaptations of writing originally generated by the technology is also a priority.
Meanwhile, several prominent studios and streamers continue to be in cost-cutting mode. As Disney conducts thousands of layoffs this spring and Showtime has recently slimmed down as it prepares to merge with the streamer Paramount+, it seems unlikely that the coalition of companies that make up the AMPTP will be willing to significantly boost writer-related costs. Moreover, companies remain highly aware that unions like the Directors Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA, which negotiate this year after the writers, are closely watching what the writers receive in 2023 as a potential precedent.
Writers last took a strike authorization vote in 2017, during a tough round of negotiations where the critical issue on the table was, again, compensation. In that year, 96.3 percent of voting members supported the strike, but the guild and studios ultimately reached a deal at the last minute that averted the shutdown. Ten years prior, however, writers went out on strike for 100 days after 90 percent of eligible members supported a strike authorization.
The WGA and studios are now in a race against the clock as the end of the guild’s contract, on May 1, looms. After that date, the WGA could call a strike at any point.
April 17, 1:12 p.m. Updated with the results of the WGA’s strike authorization vote.
