Labor follies

Today, writer-producer Craig Mazin and Web entrepreneur Matt Edelman evaluate the tactics of the two sides in the strike. Previously, they discussed the traditional view of labor as it applies to writers, the overlapping causes of writers and other Hollywood rank-and-file, the proposed contract in the context of a rapidly changing digital market and new media.

Studios sparked writer unity
By Craig Mazin

Dear Matt:

I’m a pretty outspoken guy. My union isn’t perfect — far from it. Like any association of human beings, it’s prone to error. Yes, the Writers Guild of America has made mistakes. I don’t think the reality organizing campaign worked. We spent too much money, we didn’t get any results, and the fact that our demands are still out there is thwarting a resumption of talks.

Nonetheless, it was in service of something good. I have friends who work in reality television sweatshops. The miserable way reality producers treat their employees takes its toll on health, families and marriages.

We fought the good fight, but we failed to organize better. So be it.

That’s certainly not the biggest mistake of this negotiation.

The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers takes the prize there.

The AMPTP, whose mission is to give writers, directors, actors, crew people and drivers as little as possible while getting back as much as possible, made the single biggest mistake of this negotiation when it came to the table with a proposal to convert residuals into “profit sharing.”

Ah, profit, the stuff of dreams. They tell of a man who once got some of his profit participation ... but his name is long gone now ... lost in the sands of time . . .

“The Simpsons” apparently hasn’t made a profit. If “The Simpsons” hasn’t made a profit, then I’m pretty sure God Almighty could come down from his throne on high, set up a production company, write the biggest hit movies of all time ... and also be told that his projects were still $80 million in the red.

By starting with such an egregious proposal, the companies managed to outrage the entire labor community, create unity among the WGA membership that hadn’t existed prior, push the moderates to anger and essentially signal that a strike would have to happen.

They pulled that insane proposal off the table, but it was too little, too late. The damage had been done.

The WGA has made missteps, yes, but the AMPTP kicked over the table and set the drapes on fire before the talks could even begin. For that, it is paying, you are paying, I am paying — an entire industry is paying.

Like all tragedies, this strike could have been averted.

Perhaps the AMPTP will learn the lesson. We’ll be back in three years.

Let’s hope wiser and cooler heads prevail.

Craig Mazin wrote and produced the hit comedies “Scary Movie 3” and “Scary Movie 4” and recently wrote, produced and directed the feature film “Superhero!,” coming next spring from Dimension Films. He served on the board of directors of the Writers Guild of America, West from 2004 to 2006, and he runs the popular screenwriting blog The Artful Writer.

Sorry about your union boss
By Matt Edelman

Craig, I think you’ve nailed it in terms of where the studios went wrong. It’s not even about the economics of their proposal — it’s about the use of the word “profit.” To anyone who has had to rely on Hollywood accounting to earn a living, profit is like a four-letter word. It brings physical and psychological anguish to those who participate in it. The studios should have been smarter than to go there.

However, I see the writers’ mistakes as more responsible for the current impasse. The AMPTP may have created a rallying point for the writers, but the disastrous state of affairs is due to one major miscue by the WGA: appointing David Young executive director of the Writers Guild of America, West.

This guy is a total disaster. Everything about him is wrong for this role. He’s a hard-core, blue-collar union organizer. Since when have film and TV writers been akin to carpenters and garment workers? He doesn’t know how to represent a creatively inspired, passionate, emotionally driven group of laborers and certainly doesn’t know how to speak “Hollywood.” I didn’t expect things to get as bad as they are now, but from the day Young was “hired,” it was easy to predict that things would get more ugly than necessary.

It’s time for the WGA to change tactics. The more hardball your union plays, the less likely you will get a desirable result in a timely manner. And time is no longer on your side. The Directors Guild of America, represented by a Hollywood insider in Gil Cates, will have a deal within 90 days, maybe sooner. Once the DGA starts negotiating, the WGA will have a hard time getting its calls returned.

I’m not suggesting the writers should cave on their positions. But if the WGA wants to set the modern standard for new media residuals and fees, it needs to lose Mr. Militant, focus on the core issues and sign a deal.

Cooler heads indeed.

Thanks for the discussion this week. It’s been enlightening — and fun!

Best,
Matt

Matt Edelman is the CEO of PeopleJam (www.peoplejam.com), a lifestyle web site designed to enable people to make better life decisions through video, discussion forums and social networking. He has been a producer and executive in the film, television, Internet and mobile industries, where he has developed scripted, reality and interactive projects in live-action and animation.