Friday, November 16, 2007

Here's a strategy thought for the WGA strike committee: if you can get one studio to sign a fair deal with you, the others will be forced to sign the same deal or lose market share (and they hate that).

I read that a number of Teamster trucks won't cross the WGA pickets. That impacts production immediately. Some UPS trucks, too. But the WGA pickets aren't in place 24/7, so stuff still gets through.

On the other hand, it's hard for three thousand picketers to completely cover all the studios and networks.

But what if the WGA picked one network for an all-out effort to picket them? Pick whatever network seems most likely to cave. The one that, say, has the most reality shows, because they have less to lose from paying writers fairly, and the most to lose if production is shut down. (If your scripted shows are already shut down, picketing won't bother you. If you were planning to air lots of reality shows while the other networks were dark, a production shut-down is really irritating.)

Or, figure out which network or studio seems most likely to listen to reason. Shut them down.

It's not like the studios care for each other's well-being. They can't support each other during the strike, because of anti-trust. So each is on its own.

If you can get one to cave and sign, then you can move on to the next. Who's going to want to be the studio with no product while everyone else is working merrily away?

The strike committee has done a great job of getting the word out in media-friendly ways, with Take Your Kid to Strike Day and Picketing with the Stars. Now we have to convince the stockholders that greedy negotiating is costing more than it's worth.

Labels: guild, strike

7:19 PM

4 Comments:

You mean, something like this?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4rkFvf2ZTy0

By  Unknown, at 4:52 PM  

what in crap's name are you talking about? anti-trust? what? the ampmt is a consortium of the studios that collectively bargains on their behalf.

By  Jon and Kate, at 1:55 AM  

One flaw in the plan: most reality shows shoot on location, not on the lots.

(Good to finally meet you the other day!)

By  Fun Joel, at 8:09 AM  

You'll want to confirm this with somebody who has a much better knowledge of Guild history than I do, but I believe during a past strike, one of the studios DID cave early, which forced the other studios into agreeing to a deal.

As a result, if I understand correctly, the AMPTP now has some sort of poison pill provision to punish a studio that breaks away and makes a separate deal.

I did a quick google and couldn't find any external verification of this, so I'm hoping I'm remembering correctly.

By  Jacob Sager Weinstein, at 5:11 AM  

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