Nearly five months after Hollywood screenwriters
went on a strike, a tentative deal has been struck to end the impasse between
writers and studios that has impacted the television and movie industry.
The Writers Guild of America (WGA) signed a
tentative deal with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers
(AMPTP), a labour group representing studios and streaming services, reported Deadline.
The writers’ strike began on May 2 this year after
11,500 WGA members stopped working when their contract expired.
Among the issues they were protesting included
increased pay, the use of Artificial Intelligence in the creation of scripts,
and the size of diminished writing staffs linked to streaming show performance.
“The WGA and AMPTPT have reached a tentative
agreement,” the two groups said in a joint statement on Sunday.
“We have reached a tentative agreement on a new 2023
MBA, which is to say an agreement in principle on all deal points, subject to
drafting final contract language,” the WGA told its members in a release, which
the US-based media outlet Deadline said came after five days of long
negotiations.
The deal was agreed on after five days of
negotiations after a meeting with union officials and four top media CEOs that
began on September 20 and stretched into the weekend.
Details of the WGA’s tentative agreement have not
been released but will be revealed by the guild ahead of membership ratification
votes.
The next steps in the process will see the WGA
negotiating committee vote on “whether to recommend the agreement and send it
on to the WGAW Board and WGAE Council for approval” in votes tentatively
scheduled for Tuesday, the guild said on Sunday, as per Deadline.
The three-year contract agreement must be approved
by the guild’s board and members before the strike officially ends.
The WGA informed its members that it is still on
strike, but that all protests are currently suspended.
More than 11,000 members of the Writers Guild of
America had begun the strike in May, claiming they aren’t paid fairly in the
streaming era.
“Though we negotiated intent on making a fair deal…
the studios’ responses to our proposals have been wholly insufficient, given
the existential crisis writers are facing,” said a statement from the union
leadership.
Meanwhile, the 160,000-member Screen Actors
Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA), a labour
union has been on a strike from July this year against film and television
industries has congratulated the WGA on “getting over the biggest hurdles with
AMPTP”.
“SAG-AFTRA congratulates the WGA on reaching a
tentative agreement with the AMPTP after 146 days of incredible strength, resiliency,
and solidarity on the picket lines. While we look forward to reviewing the WGA
and AMPTP’s tentative agreement, we remain committed to achieving the necessary
terms for our members,” the statement cited by Variety said.
“Since the day the WGA strike began, SAG-AFTRA
members have stood alongside the writers on the picket lines. We remain on
strike in our TV/Theatrical contract and continue to urge the studio and
streamer CEOs and the AMPTP to return to the table and make the fair deal that
our members deserve and demand,” the SAG-AFTRA added.
According to US-based media outlet Variety, this was
the second time in the history of Hollywood that actors had joined writers on
the picket lines.
ANI
