WGA Strike
Union leaders and Hollywood studios reached a tentative agreement Sunday to end a historic screenwriters strike after nearly five months, though no deal is yet in the works for striking actors.
The Writers Guild of America announced the deal in a joint statement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, the group that represents studios, streaming services and production companies in negotiations.
“WGA has reached a tentative agreement with the AMPTP,” the guild said in an email to members. “This was made possible by the enduring solidarity of WGA members and extraordinary support of our union siblings who joined us on the picket lines for over 146 days.”
The three-year contract agreement — settled on after five marathon days of renewed talks by WGA and AMPTP negotiators that was joined at times by studio executives — must be approved by the guild’s board and members before the strike officially ends.
In a longer message from the guild shared by members on social media, the writers were told the strike is not over and no one was to return to work until hearing otherwise, but picketing is to be suspended immediately.
The terms of the deal were not immediately announced. The tentative deal to end the last writers strike, in 2008, was approved by more than 90% of members.
The agreement comes just five days before the strike would’ve become the longest in the guild’s history, and the longest Hollywood strike more than 70 years.
As a result of the agreement, nightly network shows including NBC’s “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” and ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” could return to the air within days.
But as writers prepare to potentially crack open their laptops again, it’s far from back to business as usual in Hollywood, as talks have not yet resumed between studios and the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists. Crew members left with no work by the stoppage will remain unemployed for now.
“SAG-AFTRA congratulates the WGA on reaching a tentative agreement with the AMPTP after 146 days of incredible strength, resiliency and solidarity on the picket lines,” the actors union said in a statement. “While we look forward to reviewing the WGA and AMPTP’s tentative agreement, we remain committed to achieving the necessary terms for our members.”
The statement said the guild continues “to urge the studio and streamer CEOs and the AMPTP to return to the table and make the fair deal that our members deserve and demand.”
The proposed solution to the writers strike came after talks resumed on Wednesday for the first time in a month. Chief executives including Bob Iger of Disney, Ted Sarandos of Netflix, David Zaslav of Warner Bros. Discovery and Donna Langley of NBCUniversal reportedly took part in the negotiations directly.
It was reached without the intervention of federal mediators or other government officials, which had been necessary in previous strikes.
Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass issued a statement congratulating the two sides on the deal and said she is hopeful the same can happen soon with actors.
California Gov. Gavin Newsom did the same, saying writers “went on strike over existential threats to their careers and livelihoods — expressing real concerns over the stress and anxiety workers are feeling. I am grateful that the two sides have come together.”
About 11,500 members of the Writers Guild of America walked off the job May 2 over issues of pay, the size of writing staffs on shows and the use of artificial intelligence in the creation of scripts. Actors, who joined the writers on strike in July, have their own issues but there have been no discussions about resuming negotiations with their union yet.
The writers strike immediately sent late-night talk shows and “Saturday Night Live” into hiatus, and has since sent dozens of scripted shows and other productions into limbo, including forthcoming seasons of Netflix’s “Stranger Things,” HBO’s “The Last of Us,” and ABC’s “Abbot Elementary,” and films including “Deadpool 3” and “Superman: Legacy.” The Emmy Awards were also pushed from September to January.
More recently, writers had been targeting talk shows that were working around strike rules to return to air, including “ The Drew Barrymore Show,” “ Real Time With Bill Maher ” and “The Talk.” All reversed course in the face of picketing and pressure, and are likely to quickly return now.
The combined strikes made for a pivotal moment in Hollywood as creative labor faced off against executives in a business transformed and torn by technology, from the seismic shift to streaming in recent years to the potentially paradigm-shifting emergence of AI in the years to come.
Screenwriters had traditionally gone on strike more than any other segment of the industry, but had enjoyed a relatively long stretch of labor peace until spring negotiations for a new contract fell apart. The walkout was their first since 2007 and their longest since 1988.
On July 14, more than two months into the strike, the writers got a dose of solidarity and star power — along with a whole lot of new picketing partners — when they were joined by 65,000 striking film and television actors.
It was the first time the two groups had been on strike together since 1960. In that walkout, the writers strike started first and ended second. This time, studios opted to deal with the writers first.
The AMPTP first reached out to suggest renewing negotiations in August. The meetings were short, infrequent, and not productive, and talks went silent for another month.
The ongoing dual Hollywood strikes, by the American actors’ union SAG-AFTRA and the Writers Guild of America, have brought the movie and TV businesses to a grinding halt as the historic work stoppage appears headed into the fall — and perhaps beyond. The impact has already been felt on the red carpet, as actors have had to skip new interviews or promotional appearances for some of the summer’s biggest blockbusters, as well as their upcoming projects.
When Troye Sivan spoke with Billboard recently, the singer was happy to talk about his summer single, “Rush,” but was unable to discuss his work on the HBO drama The Idol, which had wrapped its run weeks earlier. “I am in total support of the strike and am holding strong with everyone in waiting it out and making sure that everyone gets treated fairly,” Sivan said, adding that he also could not discuss his upcoming starring role in the coming-of-age drama Three Months.
Sivan’s statement was pitch-perfect, according to SAG-AFTRA chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, who says that artists are expected to avoid promoting music created for film, TV and streaming under the old contract during the strike. They also cannot enter into any new music licensing agreements or approve any new tracks for film or TV projects and must cease promoting songs already licensed.
The work stoppage over issues including streaming residuals and stricter safeguards against the use of artificial intelligence has shuttered all late-night talk shows for the longest stretch in modern history. It has also raised questions about Saturday Night Live’s 49th season — expected to start in September, though a representative said there wasn’t an update on a return to air — cutting off crucial promotional avenues for rising and established musical acts.
A number of major awards shows that typically feature music performances and presenters have been put in limbo by the action that began May 2, when Hollywood writers walked out, followed by members of SAG-AFTRA (which represents actors, announcers, broadcast journalists, singers and others), who joined them on July 14 to create the first dual strikes by the two unions since 1960.
The just announced 16th annual Academy of Country Music Honors will air Aug. 23 on Fox with returning host Carly Pearce, while the 2023 MTV Video Music Awards had announced a Sept. 12 airdate just as the first strike began. A representative said the latter is still planned for the Prudential Center in New Jersey, but could not comment on whether that date might change or if the broadcast could go ahead with an unscripted show, as the Tony Awards did in June. The 2023 Billboard Music Awards are scheduled for Nov. 19.
“They are not supposed to facilitate any promotion of work done under this contract, which includes going to an awards show and accepting an award,” Crabtree-Ireland says of musicians who are also SAG-AFTRA members. He noted that it’s “virtually impossible” to find a workaround, as the rules require artists to skip red carpets, interviews and accepting their trophies onstage.
A representative for the 96th annual Academy Awards, slated to take place March 10, 2024, had no comment on the strike’s impact. Similarly, a representative for the 2024 Grammys said the show slated for Feb. 4, 2024, at Los Angeles’ Crypto.com Arena is expected to go forward, but additional information isn’t available.
In the meantime, streaming services and networks are judiciously doling out already completed movies and series, like the slate at Paramount+. It includes an Elvis Presley documentary and a Biz Markie biopic; a new CBS game show, Superfan, in which die-hard supporters of artists including LL COOL J, Shania Twain and Pitbull compete for the title of ultimate fan; and the third season of Fox’s celebrity edition of Name That Tune, featuring JoJo Siwa, the Spice Girls’ Mel C, Darren Criss and Debbie Gibson.
The trickiest tightrope for musicians who also act might be social media, according to Crabtree-Ireland: “They can tweet about anything else they want, so long as they are not promoting work done under the [current] contract.”
This story will appear in the Aug. 26, 2023, issue of Billboard.
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With film and television production shut down for the foreseeable future, the Hollywood writer and actor strikes are ravaging all the businesses that touch the movie industry, from catering to editing to flower delivery — including music synchs. After generating $382 million for record labels and nearly $1.5 billion for publishers in 2022, the sector is beginning to struggle as the strikes proceed.
“That’s been quite a dark thing,” says Stephanie Diaz Matos, head of music supervision for writer-actress Issa Rae’s Raedio, a music company that includes a publisher and label. “We have several shows that, once the actors went on strike, they stopped production.”
Adds a music publishing source: “It could be bumpy if this goes on for a really long time.”
Since the Writers Guild of America strike began in early May — and the Screen Actors Guild joined earlier this month — labels and publishers report receiving fewer requests for pitching songs. “The amount of film and TV briefs I get have gone way down,” says Mara Kuge, founder and president of Superior Music Publishing. “Briefs for trailers [some of the most highly paid placements] have also been in more mild decline as well,” adds Jack Ormandy, co-founder and CEO of SILO: Music, a publishing, management and synch house.
The Writers Guild of America, East and West, represent 11,500 movie and TV writers and have been unable to agree on a new contract with Hollywood studios and streaming services over issues like higher compensation in the streaming economy, protection from the effects of artificial intelligence, more contributions to health and pension funds and improvements in workplace standards. Thousands of actors in the SAG-AFTRA union joined the writers’ picket line July 14 after negotiations broke down with studios over a new contract of their own.
While there’s hope the strikes could be resolved by the fall, some sources fear they could drag on into 2024, frequently citing a chilling quote from an unnamed studio executive in a recent Deadline article: “The endgame is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses.”
“I don’t know what that’s going to look like in three months or six months. I’m hopeful this will come to a resolution and [the striking actors and writers] get the benefits they hope for,” says Esther Friedman, senior vp of creative film and television licensing for Sony Music Publishing. “We felt it in the late-night TV shows. Those stopped right away.”
Synch revenue is a major, and growing, source of income in the music business. According to the RIAA, synchronization licensing — the right required to use music along with visual media — increased by 24.8% in 2022, and the synch business made up 26% of all publishing royalties, says the NMPA. Placements in studio film and TV projects can earn artists up to six figures, and prominent synchs can lead to even greater financial ripple effects after a show’s release. Perhaps the greatest recent example is Kate Bush’s “Running Up That Hill (A Deal With God),” which catapulted to No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100 after an appearance in Netflix’s Stranger Things repopularized the original 1985 single.
The strikes have shocked the multimillion-dollar synch system of movie and TV music supervisors sending briefs to music publishers and labels. “Usually, if we are not getting a ton of briefs, or it’s a slower time, we’re wining-and-dining clients, checking in,” says Jessica Vaughn, head of sync for Venice. “But it’s hard to justify going to music supervisors right now and being, like, ‘Hey, how are you doing, looking for any music?’ Because some supervisors might be out of work or about to finish up one project and not sure what they’re doing next.”
For labels and publishers, the key to surviving the Hollywood strikes may be diversification — many are looking to advertisements, reality and unscripted TV shows, documentaries and overseas films to bolster synch revenue. Also: video games. According to MIDiA Research’s 2022 study on music and gaming, the gaming industry earned $138 billion in 2020, and games make up a sizable portion of the synch business. After the Hollywood strikes, Ormandy hired a new employee at his company to focus specifically on video-game licensing. Adds Vaughn: “I see this as an opportunity right now to focus in on gaming. Some people overlook gaming, but it really is huge.”
For now, labels and publishers are focusing on shows and films made before the strikes that are in post-production, and will still contribute to the synch business in the short term. But it’s tricky. “You sometimes can’t finish episodes without your writers or actors because things like voiceovers need to be added in,” Diaz Matos says.
Plus, if the strikes drag on, actors won’t be available for crucial film and TV promotion. Because of this problem, some studios are beginning to push back release dates, including the Luca Guadagnino film Challengers, starring Zendaya, which has moved from its Sept. 15 release to April 26, 2024. Because synch payments are made around three to six months after the date of a film’s release, these delays will be a pain point for music licensors, even if the placement was completed before the actors’ strike. “Down the line is where you start to feel it — three to six months out,” says the publishing source.
Superior Music Publishing’s Kuge adds that synch revenue is known to vary widely quarter by quarter. “It’s very up and down regardless,” she says. “People who deal with the world of synch are so used to it that they’re not going to feel the effects too much unless the strikes drag on for two or three quarters straight — that’s the point when it starts getting past the normal ups and downs.”
If this kind of diversification helps synch departments withstand losses from the strikes, music supervisors — those who compile soundtracks for film and TV and act as the go-between for productions and licensors — are not able to wait as long. Most supervisors are freelance contractors, working on a project-by-project basis. Sources say a number of notable music supervision firms have laid off staff members, citing the lack of projects in the pipeline.
“I actually furloughed my coordinator yesterday. I have one project I think is going to get a waiver [granted by the unions to certain independent films] — once that goes back, I think I can get her back,” says Lindsay Wolfington, a veteran music supervisor for streaming shows such as Virgin River, Monster High and the upcoming movie Love at First Sight. “We’ve all had to figure out healthcare on our own. The bank account’s not fun to look at.”
Music supervisors are not unionized, but the roughly 150-200 of them who work at Netflix are awaiting a National Labor Relations Board decision on a union-certification motion they filed last October. They’re seeking representation with the International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees, and their demands overlap with those of the striking writers and actors: more reliable payment deliveries, cost-of-living increases and healthcare and retirement and pension plans. “The rates haven’t changed in years, and it’s the same with writers and actors,” Wolfington says.
Julie Glaze Houlihan, another veteran music supervisor who has worked on Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery and other hit shows and movies, predicts the strikes will cause pain for the music business. “Clearance is going to slow down, record labels and publishers are going to lose revenue because music isn’t being licensed. It is a domino effect,” she says. “Nobody wants this to go on.” But SILO: Music’s Ormandy is more optimistic. “Though COVID was completely different for many reasons, it was also a time when the film industry just stopped, too,” he says. “What I’m banking on is that we know how to weather a similar storm.”
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