WHAT'S REALLY AT STAKE IN THE WGA STRIKE

The following was written by an Emmy-winning Showrunner with long experience in Hollywood, and published anonymously in The Ankler today. I’m publishing it here because I’m a big believer in not reinventing the wheel. This really sets out what is wrong now with Hollywood, and what’s really at stake.

TC

HOW TRUST DIED IN HOLLYWOOD

“There’s always been a struggle between art and commerce, but now I’m telling you art is getting its ass kicked, and it’s making us mean, and it’s making us bitchy, and it’s making us cheap punks and that’s not who we are.”

Aaron Sorkin wrote those words for the pilot of Studio 60 On the Sunset Strip, which premiered back in the comparatively halcyon days of 2006. Mr. Sorkin wasn’t prescient so much as he vastly underestimated commerce’s complete and utter victory over art and the white-hot rage that would engender in the artists.

Consider this: In just the past four years, the writers of television, film, and comedy/variety shows have fired their own agents — going so far as to sue them in federal court and accuse them of being “mobsters” — and gone out on strike for the first time in 15 years. Some may say — and have said — that this is because writers are “crazy” or “spiteful” or that their leadership is “militant.” And all of that may even be true, but such characterizations elide the simpler, far more accurate explanation: Writers are angry AF.

And, unfortunately, even if the WGA strike were to end tomorrow (please, God, let it end tomorrow) with the writers getting absolutely everything they’re asking for (and, God, that wouldn’t be so terrible either), we — the collective “we” of Hollywood — would still be left to contend with that rage because it won’t go away and it won’t go away because the system that engendered it is broken.

Let me let you in on something that the WGA Negotiating Committee prefers you not know: Writers don’t really care about money. I mean, we like money — don’t get me wrong — but we practice our craft for its own sake. And the way you can tell is that, right now, half of television writers are working at guild minimum. We let that happen. Does that sound to you like people who are in it for the money? No, it doesn’t. We’re in it for the love of the game. The problem is... the game is no longer lovable.

Here are just a couple of examples: Screenwriters have watched opportunities dry up as studios eschew mid-budget movies that used to be the lifeblood of the feature side of the industry in favor of “blockbusters” (some ultimately more so than others). And those screenwriters lucky enough to get a gig are constrained by single-step deals which result in their payments being held hostage to free work. Even more soul-crushing, their hope of writing something original is a pipe dream in a land where studios worship at the altars of “intellectual property” and “pre-awareness.”

Things are arguably even worse on the television side. Writers for streaming shows are used to “development” that goes on for years and years. In broadcast (remember that?), the deadline of May upfronts kept everyone honest, but the recent move to “year-round development” now just means that development is a never-ending process. It used to be that the price of admission was a pilot pitch; now it’s a “pitch” for multiple seasons combined with a visual deck (if not a full-on sizzle reel) and, hey, an actor attachment and a filmmaker wouldn’t hurt either. And showrunners? They’re as interchangeable and disposable as feature writers have always been. (The biggest unsung offender on this front is easily Amazon. Here’s a partial list of all the shows where they’ve fired and replaced the showrunner: Carnival Row, Citadel, Gen V, Goliath, Jack Ryan, Paper Girls, The Summer I Turned Pretty.)

How Did We Get Here?

It’s tempting to cast the blame on the creative executives at the various streamers, networks, platforms, and studios. They’re the ones who can’t locate the courage to order a series without four scripts and a bible. They’re the ones who would sooner greenlight a movie about a board game from the 1950s than a — gasp— original idea. They’re the ones who give notes for hours on end but have never seen a minute of The Godfather or The Wire.

But here is where the plot twists: It’s not their fault. Bad notes and bad process comes from a singular place: Fear.

And who can blame creative executives for being afraid these days?

The past few years have seen consolidation among studios and their corporate parents at a rate that would make John Sherman spin in his grave. (Sen. John Sherman was the principal author of America’s first law prohibiting anti-competitive practices and monopolies.) And with every sale, every merger, comes a new round of layoffs. Creative executives are playing a game of musical chairs — and they’re losing. So who could blame them for buying a screenplay based on a short story written for the sole purpose of being turned into a screenplay? Who could blame them for wanting pitches for TV series that are ready to be put on the air tomorrow, complete with cast and directors attached? Who could blame them for not trusting the audience to understand what it is that they’re watching? (As the title of this essay suggests, trust — and the lack thereof, anti-trust — is a big factor here.)

Now, lest you think this is yet another writer screed against the evils of notes, please let me disabuse you of that notion. No writer worth their salt wouldn’t gratefully accept that which would make their script, their series, their film better. But the problem is that there are two types of notes. No, I don’t mean “good” and “bad.” I mean that there are notes which are given out of a sincere desire to improve the work being produced. And then there are notes given out of the equally sincere desire — if not desperate hunger — to justify the job of the person giving the notes. This, of course, brings me back to the point that fear has profoundly — but understandably — gripped our industry’s creative executives. It’s a fear they’ve come by honestly for all the reasons I’ve articulated and some I’m sure to be unaware of. These people — smart people, good people — have both my sympathy and my empathy. (Hell, if anyone can empathize with someone whose job security has been threatened by corporate consolidation, believe me, it’s a writer.)

Now, if you accept my thesis that fear is what is destroying our industry, what, you might ask, is the solution? My friends, I submit to you that the cure to fear is trust. And trust is in phenomenally short supply these days. We are living at a time of antitrust (in the monopolistic sense) and anti-trust (in the sense that no one trusts each other).

If you look at the WGA’s pattern of demands, much of what writers are striking for is a function of the fact that the bond of trust between writers and producers has completely broken down. Writers don’t trust studios not to replace them with generative AI. Television writers don’t trust studios not to eliminate writing staffs entirely if the practice is not codified in the MBA. And even if staffs are worked into the MBA, writers don’t trust studios not to create loopholes but for the requirement of a minimum staff size.

Believe it or not, there was a period when our industry functioned better. It was a time, long since forgotten, when writers and executives trusted one another (or, at the very least, far more than they do now). If you were a writer and were lucky enough to make a studio or network your home for a number of years, you would find yourself working with the same executives. You could develop a shorthand. You enjoyed a bond of mutual trust. The writer would trust that the executive’s notes were coming from an honest, sincere place and the executive would trust the writer would hear them with an open mind and use their notes to make the film or show better. And isn’t that the purpose of the notes process? (I WAS THERE - IT REALLY WAS LIKE THAT - TC)

Unfortunately, the development process has been taffied out to the point where the executive who starts on the project is unlikely to still be involved by the time the project sees the light of day. The reason? The aforementioned game of musical chairs the executives are playing thanks to corporate consolidation. (BTW, Sen. Sherman’s laws were called “antitrust” laws. Ironic, no?) And because creative executives are as interchangeable as, say, a showrunner working for Amazon, there is no opportunity for them to form a relationship with the writers they work with. The math here is depressingly simple: No relationship, no history. No history, no trust. And without trust, the notes process is as unpleasant for the executive as it is for the writer. But who cares about “unpleasant,” right? After all, that’s what writers and executives are paid the dwindling bucks for.

Again, I’m compelled to remind you (and myself) of the purpose of notes: It’s to make that which is being noted better. That’s it. And bad notes lead to a bad script. (Now, I know some of you reading this think the script isn’t all that important in the grand scheme of things but, By the way, that’s why you’re going back to reshoots when the SAG-AFTRA strike is over.) And a bad script leads to a bad show or terrible movie. And lest you think the audience is too jaded or too dumb to care that they’re watching dreck, think again. This is not the summer of Barbenheimer merely because audiences love plastic dolls and nuclear war, and people aren’t watching The Bear for the food porn.

‘Good Art is Good for Business’

We call our business an “industry” because we make a product. We should want to make the best product possible. Not because that’s how we’ll keep our jobs (though it is). Not because that’s how we’ll all make more money (though we will). But because our product actually isn’t a product. It is art. No matter what else we might want to call it — I’m looking at you, content — it’s art. Even the most banal procedural on broadcast is art. The latest CGI-stuffed threequel may not win an Oscar for Best Picture, but it’s still art. And believe it or not, there is a rapacious demand for good art from the people we make it for. Bottom line — which the studios are devoted to — good art is good for business.

If all of this sounds overly idealistic and simplistic — and I admit it’s both — that’s a bit by design. I’m being reductive in the vain hope of finding a silver bullet to cure what ails us. Unfortunately, our industry’s problems are greater than any silver bullet — or twin labor actions — can solve. But the first step to solving any problem is to recognize that there is one. 

I wrote this essay out of the fear (there’s that word again) that once these strikes are over — and, by God, they will be over eventually — we will be tempted to think that everything is fine, that our industry is healthy, and that good days are on the horizon. But the only way for everything to be fine, for our industry to be healthy, and for good days to be on the horizon is if we start being honest with ourselves and each other and start working together to make our industry better than it is today.

To that end, we need to hit the brakes hard on mergers and corporate consolidations. We need to return the jobs of being writers and creative executives to the careers — not gigs — they once were. This means allowing writers and executives to focus on doing their jobs, not merely keeping them. This will result in a better notes and development process that will result in better scripts which will result in better movies and television shows. And while we’re at it, let’s smash the false idol of “IP” to pieces and empower writers and executives to develop new and original ideas that not only entertain the audience but demonstrate a modicum of respect for their intelligence. Yet again, Mr. Sorkin is as instructive as he is inspirational. To paraphrase his work on The American President (which, not for nothing, is a darn good flick despite not being based on preexisting IP): “They want good entertainment. They’re so thirsty for it they’ll crawl through the desert towards a mirage and when they discover there’s no water, they’ll drink the sand.”

Our industry stands at a crossroads. We have a choice whether to pay people commensurate with the value of their work, to treat them with decency and respect (and, yes, that includes executives), and to respect the intelligence of our customers, the audience. Film and television is America’s most profitable product, its last great export, and it needs us all to step up, right now, in this moment if it’s going to continue to produce the blockbusters and hits that have been its foundation.

If I have but one prayer, it’s this: I hope we’re not too late.

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