Energy at Writers Guild Deal Meeting Akin to a “Rock Concert”

Meredith Stiehm, president of WGA West, began the meeting by making the "official" declaration that the guild has struck a tentative new three-year Minimum Basic Agreement following what was the second-longest strike in the history of the union. As she acknowledged each and every member of the WGA's leadership, board, negotiating committee, as well as recently elected officers, her statements were greeted by successive standing ovations. The chief negotiator for the guild who replaced David Young after he went on medical leave in February, Ellen Stutzman, received the loudest applause of the evening from the roughly 1,000 guild members who filled the Palladium to its rafters.

By pointing out that when the studio top

Chris Keyser, co-chair of the WGA's bargaining committee, told members on Wednesday that the writers guild "is kind of a miracle," praising the rank-and-file's unity and reiterating that the AMPTP, not the guild, "chose" this strike.

"Once the four CEOs finally took control, the deal was done in essentially three days," he added, citing the $5 billion in losses to the California economy as evidence of how useless the organization that represents Hollywood's studios and streamers is. "There is still work to be done. We must enforce it... We must inform writers and showrunners of the regulations and remind members to contact the guild if they are under pressure to waive their rights.

Keyser, who is well-known for inspiring the union with his speeches, also thanked Drew Carey and everyone else who supported the WGA during the strike. After paying for guild members during the WGA strike at Bob's Big Boy in Burbank and Swingers on the west side of Los Angeles, Carey has earned a reputation as a guild favorite. For the first two months of the strike, he spent $250,000 at Bob's. The gathering members gave a standing ovation to "Fake Carol" Lombardini, the social media account that mocks the president of the AMPTP, as well as Carey, who was not present. (The person behind the popular account is still unknown.)

Stutzman then went over the contract with the MBA.

Following a Q&A session, members asked how they could help SAG-AFTRA, which is currently 60 or so days into its own strike against the AMPTP and is now expected to start discussions next week. Leaders of the guild urged members to attend SAG-AFTRA and mentioned that there would be other chances to support the other unions, such as the United Auto Workers.

It's been fantastic to at least have a small group of people I can talk to about it because it's more unusual than hard, but I do have a few close friends that know.

Do you have a part of you that thinks exposing your identity might help your career? Do you worry, on the other hand, that disclosing your name would hurt your career?

The fact is that my career has been incredibly sluggish over the last few years, largely due to the strike that authors embarked on for the sake of our entire industry. The effects of the change to streaming have merely slowly diminished my capacity to sustain a stable profession once I established myself and achieved some success. So far, it has