“Hey hey, ho ho, corporate greed has got to go!” chanted film and TV writers outside Netflix’s Sunset Bronson studio lot on Tuesday, as hundreds of WGA members marched up and down the streets on the first day of the first writers’ strike in over 15 years.
“We made a deal on residuals back when we didn't quite understand streaming, and now that we have a better understanding of the business, we want to revise it to be more fair and transparent,” said How I Met Your Mother scribe Brenda Hsueh, who currently works on Apple TV+’s The Afterparty and was just getting her start in the business during the 2007-2008 strike.
Worrying technological advancements are still on writers’ minds in 2023, and The Ankler staffers spotted several AI-related picket signs, including one at Netflix that read “Replace executives with AI.” (The AMPTP rejected the WGA’s proposal to regulate use of AI on TV and film projects.)
WGA strike captain Billy Wise told The Ankler on the Sony lot that it “seems like every negotiation there's a new technology and a revenue stream that we have to fight for all over again.”
Still, the mood among writers on Day One was buoyant across town, from Warner Bros. in Burbank to Sony in Culver City. Here’s how the first official day of the WGA strike played out:
2% from the 1% is a great one!
"Residual Anger" was the only funny one. They have a reason to worry about being replaced by computers.