Joaqlin Estus
ICT
The union representing screenwriters reached a tentative agreement with Hollywood studios to end a historic strike after nearly five months, raising hopes that a crippling shutdown of movie and television filming could be near an end.
Actors remain on strike, but the deal with writers might help them find a resolution soon as well.
The Writers Guild of America announced the deal Sunday 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. The agreement must be approved by the guild’s board and members before the strike officially ends. That could happen this week.
Writer Vera Starbard, Tlingit and Dena’ina Athabascan, said she’s cautiously optimistic. “I think it’s been five months now with very little light at the end of the tunnel, and now it seems like this might work. I feel like I’m going to jinx it if I get too excited though.” Starbard said the union has been frank when negotiations were going poorly so she’s encouraged that the union’s latest letter was “pretty positive.”
Starbard is the author of plays and was a writer for the now-ended television series “Alaska Daily.”
Since the strike, she’s had some small contracts for work not covered by the union. “You kind of pick up what you can in five months. It does start to make you a little nervous that you’re ever going to go back to sort of the full-time work we had before. So I was getting a little bit worried, staying busy, but not quite busy enough,” she said.
Starbard said other writers, in some states, have been able to collect unemployment. Others drove for Uber or picked up gig work, “whatever they can to sort of get by.”
About 11,500 members of the Writers Guild of America walked off the job May 2 over issues of pay, the size of writing staff 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. Residuals from shows viewed by streaming were also a concern.
Starbard said, “I hope the public understands just how much their support, their very vocal support in social media and watching or not watching things. That played a huge part in how the studios felt. The last strike that the union had didn’t have as much public support and we didn’t get as fair terms as we were asking for. And I think the public really very vocally and very visibly saying, ‘Hey, everyone needs to be paid fairly from the writers, to the actors, to the people who set up the lights and cameras.’ That played a huge part in getting us to this point.
Union members have stopped picketing but will await the results of a vote on the terms of the settlement before agreeing to return to work.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
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