Hollywood writers down tools

Hollywood writers have gone on strike for the first time in almost two decades after last-ditch talks between unions and studios failed.Talks broke off between East Coast members of the Writers Guild of America, representing around 12,000 writers, and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers after 11 hours on Sunday.The two sides hit an impasse primarily over demands by writers for higher fees, or "residuals," derived from the sale of movies and TV programmes on DVDs and the web.Producers said writers were not willing to compromise on their major demands having previously called the strike "precipitous and irresponsible."The Writers Guild announced plans to picket every major studio in Los Angeles from 9am on Monday, along with Rockefeller Center in New York, where broadcaster NBC has its headquarters.The strike is expected to shut down many sitcoms and send popular late-night talk shows such as NBC's The Tonight Show With Jay Leno and CBS' Late Show With David Letterman.Prolonged action could cost hundreds of millions of dollars in lost revenues and wages.Even though studios have stockpiled scripts in preparation for a strike, production of many sitcoms is expected to shut down this week since writers will not be able to go on set and offer last-minute rewrites.The impact on movies is seen as less immediate since the major studios already have scripts for next year's projects.Union members have been told that picketing is compulsory, and to hand over unfinished work to the union to ensure that that there is no furtive writing.The strike poses a dilemma for writers who are also producers or creators of their shows.Spike Feresten, a former writer/producer in the Seinfeld show who now has his own weekly talkshow on Fox, said: "I have to figure out how to strike and picket myself. How do you egg yourself? How does that work?"Meanwhile, British actress Kelly Macdonald said: "It's not affecting me right now but I think they should get what they want, they're pivotal, and fingers crossed it all resolves itself quite quickly."But producer of The Matrix, Joel Silver, said: "It's going to be a bad thing, it's bad. I mean look, it's going to have to end some day, but I hope it doesn't ever start. I have a television show on CBS, Moonlight would kill us, just kill us."While Grey's Anatomy actor Patrick Dempsey said: "We have one episode to be completed and then after that they're not allowed to write anymore."So we've completed 11 episodes for this season and depending on how long the strike goes that maybe it for the season."And I think it doesn't affect me as dramatically as it's going to affect the people on the crew and I think the people that are around this business that are supported are going to be affected."© Independent Television News Limited 2007. All rights reserved.

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ITN | November 5, 2007

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