Today’s Headlines: Hollywood writers picket studios for better pay

Hello, it’s Wednesday, May 3, and here are the stories you shouldn’t miss today.

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Hollywood writers picket studios for better pay

Just hours after the expiration of a midnight deadline to reach an agreement with major Hollywood studios on a new contract, thousands of members of the Writers Guild of America set down their pens, stepped away from their laptops and took their fight to the streets on Tuesday.

Forming picket lines outside more than a dozen studios and production facilities in Los Angeles and New York, including the headquarters of Netflix and Amazon Studios, writers hoisted placards and chanted in unison to demand what they regard as fair compensation and improved working conditions in an industry that has been upended by streaming.

More about the strike:

• A long strike could have a ripple effect on not only film and television production but the Southern California economy as a whole.
• What shows are affected by the writers’ strike? “SNL” and and other late-night offerings are among the first.
• TV hosts Jimmy Fallon and Stephen Colbert voice support for the Writers Guild of America.
• In the days before the strike, the creators of hit shows, including “Ted Lasso” and “The Last of Us,” gathered to discuss the state of the industry.
• What can you work on, or not, during the strike? Here’s what Hollywood writers need to know.
• There are several funds available that can provide temporary assistance for those in dire financial situations due to the strike.
• For most people who write for film and TV, the gigs are anything but steady. So while the strike is a definitive interruption, this is a workforce that’s accustomed to finding ways to make ends meet.
  

Stabbing, traffic crash, fentanyl overdoses prompt safety action at LAUSD

During one school day this week, Los Angeles Unified grappled with three major emergencies: a double stabbing outside a high school, multiple suspected fentanyl overdoses at a middle school and a traffic collision outside an elementary school that badly injured a child.

The violence and trauma Monday were so alarming that they prompted a Tuesday-morning phone call between Mayor Karen Bass and L.A. schools Supt. Alberto Carvalho. The two pledged to work together to confront what feels to many parents like a school safety crisis.

City Hall weighs a trade-off in downtown: Housing vs. jobs

Two years ago, policymakers at City Hall came up with a plan to dramatically increase the number of new homes that could be built in downtown Los Angeles, part of their larger strategy for addressing rapidly rising housing costs.

But a key element of that plan has drawn fierce opposition from some of downtown’s lowest-wage workers, who fear that new condominiums and apartment towers will push out garment businesses.

California’s colossal snowpack has yet to melt

California’s remarkably wet winter may be several weeks behind us, but flooding remains a significant threat as the majority of the state’s massive snowpack has yet to melt, and more snow is forecast for this week.

A Department of Water Resources crew on Monday conducted its fifth snow survey of the year and determined that statewide snowpack was 254% of normal for the date.

Disunity in the U.K. as King Charles III’s coronation nears

As King Charles III formally ascends the British throne at Westminster Abbey on Saturday, millions of his compatriots will cheer the continuity of the monarchy, whose storied roots date back a millennium.

However, the lavish display of pomp and ancient ritual underscores a deepening sense of drift and disaffection in corners of a kingdom that consists not only of England, but also Wales, Scotland and Northern Ireland — all of which have their own complicated takes on the matter.

Or perhaps not so complicated.

PHOTO OF THE DAY

Joe and Vera Abner walk through a vacant lot that was in Section 14 of Palm Springs. When he was 13, Joe’s family fled the neighborhood as the home his father had built was razed and turned to soot. The city called it “slum clearance.” Read more: “How Palm Springs ran out Black and Latino families to build a fantasy for rich, white people”

(Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)

CALIFORNIA

A third stabbing in less than a week rocks the college town of Davis. The seemingly random violent attacks have stunned residents in the town of 68,000 just west of Sacramento, which had not had a reported homicide since 2019.

For this California teen, coverage of early psychosis treatment proved a lifesaver. A program that offers intensive early treatment to people with severe mental illness aims to save taxpayers money that might otherwise be spent on costlier, emergency interventions.

On Sunset Boulevard, Knicks fans create a portal to Madison Square Garden. Sports bar 33 Taps in Silver Lake has become the place for expat New Yorkers to watch Knicks games.

NATION-WORLD

U.S. authorizes sending 1,500 troops to the southern border ahead of Title 42 orders ending. The move comes ahead of the anticipated increase of migrants arriving at the southern border when a pandemic-related border policy expires next week.

Former Minneapolis police officer Tou Thao was convicted of aiding George Floyd’s killing. Thao, who already had been convicted in federal court of violating Floyd’s civil rights, was the last of the four former officers facing judgment in state court in Floyd’s killing.

The U.S. to lift most federal COVID-19 vaccine mandates next week. Vaccine requirements for federal workers and federal contractors, as well as foreign air travelers to the U.S., will end May 11.

Loneliness is an epidemic, and the health risks are ‘profound,’ the U.S. surgeon general warns. Isolation and loneliness are an epidemic as damaging to individual and public health as smoking and obesity.

HOLLYWOOD AND THE ARTS

Serena Williams brought a surprise guest to the Met Gala. The tennis superstar revealed Monday that she and husband Alexis Ohanian are expecting their second child by showing off her baby bump on the Met Gala carpet.

J. Harrison Ghee and Alex Newell make Tony Awards history as the first nonbinary-identifying actor nominees. The milestone for the actors follows last year’s historic first, when Toby Marlow — who wrote the book, music and lyrics of “Six” with Lucy Moss — became the first nonbinary person to receive a Tony nomination and win.

Nielsen recount: Super Bowl LVII adds 2 million viewers to become the most-watched show ever. Fox Sports said Nielsen restated the total average viewership number for the Feb. 12 game after a review by the ratings company found irregularities in the encoding used to measure the audience. There were also problems with the data for out-of-home viewing.

BUSINESS

Low wages and short hours drive many fast-food workers into homelessness. In addition to low wages, fast-food workers are hamstrung by part-time hours and unpredictable on-demand scheduling. Combined, that can create and perpetuate poverty and undercut workers’ ability to pay rent.

$12 smartwatches? This app promises you can ‘shop like a billionaire.’ But is there a catch? With Temu, you can “shop like a billionaire,” an ad promises. U.S. lawmakers are suspicious of the Chinese e-commerce company — it went from unknown to the most downloaded app in the country in a matter of months.

SPORTS

Trea Turner might have stayed in L.A., but Dodgers never made him an offer. In what has become a common theme for a franchise that has watched a parade of premium talent walk out the door in recent years, the Dodgers never came close to keeping Turner in the Southland.

Chargers were supposed to draft a tight end. Here’s why they decided against it. After the seventh round Saturday, coach Brandon Staley explained that the draft unfolded in a way that didn’t mesh with whatever interest the Chargers had in the various tight ends available at the time.

OPINION

Opinion: If the Supreme Court kills the Chevron doctrine, corporations will have even more power. If the conservative justices abandon the doctrine just because they have the votes, they will reinforce the message from Dobbs vs. Jackson Women’s Health last year that relying on precedent is out the window.

Column: After a family in Texas is massacred, the language of gun violence fails us. Leaders send out their “thoughts and prayers” — once a sign of compassion, now a phrase that shows the speaker is putting in no thought at all, just reflexively using religion as a cover for inaction.

ONLY IN L.A.

The rent is high. The apartment is a dump. When can I move in?

(Getty / Los Angeles Times)

Despite news of an L.A. exodus, the housing market shows no sign of cooling.

In writer Zoë Bernard’s hunt for an apartment, she saw more than 30 places: dumps and palaces and everything in between. At nearly every open house, she was pitted against New Yorkers who, like her, had decamped from Brooklyn in search of sunlight and a place to park their cars.

FROM THE ARCHIVES

Horses run the Susan’s Girl ahead of the 146th running of the Kentucky Oaks at Churchill Downs on Sept. 4, 2020, in Louisville.

(Jamie Squire / Getty Images)

On this day 71 years ago, the Kentucky Derby — the most prestigious American horse race — was televised nationally for the first time.

Every May, racing fans flock to Churchill Downs in Louisville, Ky., eager to watch thoroughbreds — many of them reared in the rolling hills nearby — tear around the track.

While the Derby has brought billions of dollars and infinite pride to the Bluegrass State, little attention is paid to the critical role Black equestrians played in forming the industry in the late 1800s.

In 2019, The Times wrote about Black jockeys who helped create the Kentucky Derby.

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