Is Your Year Really Looking This Bleak?
Tell us what you expect work to look like over the next four months
As August comes to a close, all eyes are now on September as a possible, hopeful end to the twin strikes now going on Day 120 (WGA) and Day 47 (SAG-AFTRA), respectively. While there’s no visible indication that the Writers Guild of America and Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers have met this week following their flurry of activity in previous weeks, we at least know some progress has been made since their last point of contact in May — even if there’s still a fairly wide berth to be breached.
But that’s no assurance to entertainment industry workers — including crew, production company staffers, agency assistants, literary managers, etc. — who have been out of work for months now, as savings dwindle, layoffs mount, mental health suffers, and side hustles are pressured to become main sources of income.
As Labor Day approaches, marking the end of summer, it’s not surprising to hear that folks are trying to sort out what the rest of their professional 2023 looks like. Last week, you heard one actor tell us she believes “this year doesn’t exist for me, career-wise. The whole year is fucked.”
That largely depends on when, exactly, new three-year WGA and SAG-AFTRA contracts can be inked.
If scribes can get back into the writers rooms by mid-October or so, one high-level studio exec tells me, then production will likely resume by January 2024. (If the WGA and AMPTP cut a deal next week and gave membership a couple weeks to ratify the deal, that would theoretically be possible.) But if the strike goes beyond that, then the broadcast TV season gets really thrown out of whack. The Ankler himself, Richard Rushfield, hears that “some of the studios in town are hopefully eyeing a mid-October re-start to production.”
Whether you’re a writer, actor, crew member, studio staffer, manager, agent or support staffer, I’m curious about what you think the rest of your work year looks like. If the strike ends by the end of September, what work can be salvaged before the holidays quiet the town again? How does this impact your finances, your feelings about your career, your professional trajectory?
Talk to me: elaine@theankler.com. (And please let me know if you’re comfortable with me re-printing your response in our next newsletter. I’m happy to withhold names if it allows you to speak with candor.)
Elsewhere on The Ankler
Rushfield has already started looking past the end of the strikes, and what kind of repair work the town will have to do to itself then, both to its relationships and its now-paused project pipeline:
If it's not going to be balloons and a marching band greeting everyone back at the gates, to rub salt in the festering wounds, the starting gun is not going to trigger an immediate back to work for many either. When the cameras shuttered, it triggered a massive pile-up on the runway where every project of the last half year is essentially all jammed up together.
For the top projects, when the all-clear sounds, every agent and executive in town is going to have to be working round the clock to untangle every star’s schedule, every booking of every production space. If production reopens, say, on October 25th, does whoever had the sound stages booked for that date originally get them? Or will there be a massive fight for precedence on every booking, every opening in the star's schedules? Will this mean that the bigger, giant tentpoles use their muscle to go first and the little projects have to wait? Will Ari, Patrick, Jeremy, Bryan, et al, convene a conclave to decree the order of production for the next year? (With big money no doubt talking the loudest.)
Read Rushfield’s latest column, only for paid subscribers to The Ankler.
Today in Strike News
Late-night hosts Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Stephen Colbert, Seth Meyers, and John Oliver have formed “Strike Force Five,” a limited-series podcast delving into the WGA strike that will donate all proceeds to the hosts’ respective staffs. (Variety) Also: Strikegeist can exclusively report that WME partner and co-head of digital Ben Davis and head of WME-owned Dixon Talent James Dixon brokered the deal.
In just the last week or so, the Entertainment Community Fund has gone from distributing over $4.7 million to more than 2,300 workers to granting upwards of $5.4 million to 2,600 affected by the strike. (Deadline)
Young actors just beginning their Hollywood careers have seen opportunities vanish in the past few months, something that’s caused many to fall off the path entirely. “I felt really drained being in LA,” says Serena Kashmir, who has decided to move to Colorado and give up on acting as a career. “Moving to Colorado was a really big decision, because it felt like giving up in a way.” (Reuters)
In a strike, no one can hear you shut down: FX’s Alien series, based on the eponymous horror film franchise, has suspended production after over a month of filming overseas. Production will reportedly resume after the strike ends. (ComicBook)
Without a proper film festival circuit this year, the 2024 Oscars are eyeing a shortened, less intensive awards campaign season. “Everyone always complains — not without justification — about how long and repetitive the awards season is,” says one awards consultant. “Well, this year, the strikes are going to shorten it. Who knows by how long. But if they are settled later this fall, you’re going to see studios scrambling to get their movies some awards traction ... and that could be kind of fun.” (Los Angeles Times)
Almost all stand-up comedy shows don’t begin before sundown, but outside of Fox on Monday, a group of comics held a performance to lighten up the mood on the picket line. “Right now is a pivotal time in history for actors and writers to defy crappy pay and working conditions, not to mention lack of health benefits,” comedian and Roast Battle L.A. champion Sarah Fatemi told the crowd. “I mean, who do you guys think you are? Stand-up comedians?” (Los Angeles Times)
The Directors Guild of Canada-Ontario has elected to donate as much as $100,000 to the Actors Fund of Canada, with the intention being to bestow grants to struggling actors. (The Hollywood Reporter)
Picket Sign of the Day
Topical.
Additional reporting for Today in Strike News by Matthew Frank.
Disclosure: Elaine Low is an inactive member of SAG-AFTRA.