By Nina Metz, Chicago Tribune
Now that the strike by the Writers Guild of America, which started in May, seems to be over, what occurs now?
The WGA’s almost 12,000 members have till Oct. 9 to ratify the contract. Here are a few of the particulars, as outlined on the WGA web site:
- Baseline minimal wages will go up 5% as soon as the contract is ratified. They will go up a further 4% within the spring of 2024 and three.5% the next 12 months.
- Artificial intelligence was a serious sticking level and right here’s what each side agreed to: “AI can’t write or rewrite literary material, and AI-generated material will not be considered source material under the (contract), meaning that AI-generated material can’t be used to undermine a writer’s credit or separated rights.”
- There will likely be a brand new viewership-based streaming pay bonus utilized to TV exhibits and flicks “that are viewed by 20% or more of the service’s domestic subscribers in the first 90 days of release.”
- That additionally means streamers have agreed to offer to the WGA, “subject to a confidentiality agreement, the total number of hours streamed, both domestically and internationally, of self-produced high budget streaming programs (e.g., a Netflix original series).” That’s a comparatively restricted slice knowledge (streamers use all types of metrics to evaluate worth, together with issues like completion price) however it’s the first time any quantity of streaming transparency has been codified in a contract. For the remainder of us who gained’t be aware about this confidential info, the information should still be murky.
Up subsequent is getting a contract for actors, represented by SAG-AFTRA, who stay on strike. WGA members are prone to proceed picketing with them, although it’s unclear whether or not or not writers will return to work even when actors are nonetheless on strike.
Chances are, a cope with actors will occur shortly as properly. Everyone desires to get again to work and if the studios have been motivated sufficient to conform to a mutually agreeable contract with writers in spite of everything this time, it’s most likely secure to imagine they’re able to wrap this up with actors too.
Once that occurs, meaning crew members — who’ve additionally been out of labor throughout a lot of the strike — will likely be again on the job once more. So that is excellent news for everybody working within the movie trade, together with exhibitors who’re most likely respiration a sigh of reduction as properly.
Talk exhibits — late-night and daytime — will probably be again on TV first. “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” returns with new episodes Monday, Oct. 2. One has to marvel what the ambiance will likely be like for returning workers at “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon,” after allegations of a poisonous office have been reported earlier this month, and at “The Drew Barrymore Show,” after the host initially deliberate to maneuver ahead together with her present earlier this month regardless of the strike, solely to vary her thoughts after the choice personally garnered her unhealthy press and pushback from the WGA.
As for scripted sequence, it should take some time for issues to ramp again up. On community TV, we most likely gained’t see new episodes of weekly exhibits returning till someday within the new 12 months. Instead of a typical 22-episode season for exhibits equivalent to “Chicago Fire” and the like, anticipate a 13-episode season beginning within the winter. In phrases of writers getting the season mapped out and people first scripts polished and able to shoot, the numbers I’m listening to are within the 8 to 10-week neighborhood.
On the streaming facet, it means each present that has halted manufacturing — together with “Stranger Things” — will resume as soon as actors are additionally free to return to work. Shows that have been in growth however paused throughout the strike are additionally again within the recreation. Streaming is a precarious enterprise and there’s at all times the possibility that executives will resolve to easily transfer on from any variety of tasks that have been in varied levels of growth when the strikes started. Then once more, streamers even have a pipeline drawback: They don’t have an limitless backlog of latest exhibits, which they’re going to want in 2024, even when that quantity will likely be considerably decrease than in years previous.
Source: www.bostonherald.com”