Hollywood Writers Strike Avoided

Three days after the collective contract of Hollywood writers expired and the film and television industry was bracing itself for a crippling strike, the Writers Guild of America (WGA) and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) announced today that they have reached an agreement for a new three-year contract deal.

According to media site Inside.com, Writers Guild treasurer Michael Mahern announced the agreement at a press conference at the guild's headquarters. Mahern said the new contract included "groundbreaking improvements, and without a strike."

The writers managed to get many of their financial demands satisfied. In total, the new contract will give the writers $41 million extra over a period of three years, which apparently makes it the Guild's most lucrative contract since 1977. Minimum pay rates for film and TV writers will be increased by 3.5% annually.

Under the terms of the new agreement, the Fox television network will no longer receive a discount in paying residuals, and cable networks will also have to pay writers more. Foreign TV residuals will not be limited anymore, with writers eligible to now receive a percentage of the studios' profit on the productions they write for. Negotiations over some other issues, such as residual payments for internet downloads, still continue.

On the creative rights side, the writers agreed to drop their demand to limit the use of the "a film by" credit for directors. Writers had previously always fought this credit, saying that it diminished their own contributions to films, but they took this demand off the bargaining table to prevent a strike.

The writers did get a few minor concessions on creative issues. The contract required producers to invite them to premieres and other major promotional events, and there will be a set of non-binding guidelines for directors, incrasing the involvement of writers in the production process. Finally, a new committee of the Directors Guild and the Writers Guild will be set up to discuss creative issues.

Though a new contract has been agreed upon by negotiatiors, is must still be approved by the Writers Guild's supervisory board and ratified by its members. With many of the board members also having served as negotiators, however, it is seen as very unlikely that the deal will be rejected.

The previous Writers Guild contract expired early on Wednesday morning, but negotiators agreed to continue talking, hopeful that a deal could be reached. The fact that both sides had even agreed to continue talking was generally seen as a very positive sign.

Negotiators called it a day yesterday at 5:30pm, but agreed to resume talks this morning at 10:00am. Rumours abounded the whole day that the two sides were close to reaching an agreement, and after the Directors Guild of America was brought in for late-minute negotiations over creative rights issues they were apparently indeed able to reach an agreement that was acceptable to all sides.

Though an agreement has now been reached between the producers and the writers, there is still the threat of a strike by Hollywood actors. The Screen Actors Guild's contract expires on the 30th of June, and negotiations aren't expected to start until next week. However, with the writers now having reached an agreement it also seems much more likely actors and producers will also be able to settle their differences.

For Series V, this can only be described as a very positive thing. With shooting currently still thought to start on Tuesday, Paramount will only be able to finish the pilot and one or two additional episodes before the 1st of July. If it is possible to also avoid a strike of Hollywood actors, the next series' first season should be able to go into full production without any serious problems.

For more on this, please check out this Reuters report.

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