Unions | SpoutBlog

The Upside of the Strike

By Karina Longworth posted 9 months ago

Dear WGA,

I’m sorry for your troubles. I really, really am. But strike beards are sexy. Even the New Yorker says so. And you saw those paparazzi shots of Conan O’Brien, walking around town like a high-fashion lumberjack, right? If a strike beard can do that for Conan, just imagine what it could do for a piece of ass like JJ Abrams. I know it’s wrong, but strike beards kind of make me hope that the AMPTP finds a way to drag this thing out a little bit longer. I mean, not indefinitely––give me, like, a week to get the unshaven screenwriter fantasies out of my system, and then you can go back to the bargaining table. Okay? New episodes of 30 Rock for Valentine’s Day, perhaps?

Love,

Karina

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Hollywood

Slippery Stats: Trade Roughage 11/26/07

By Karina Longworth posted 10 months ago

A survey conducted by Variety found that, with a resolution to the writers strike still indeterminate, the WGA is so far winning the war of public opinion. “[M]ore than two-thirds of respondents agreed that the scribes are being ‘more honest and forthright’ than the majors in their discussion of the key issues,” Cynthia Littleton writes. Though 61% of all respondents agreed that the strike was “necessary,” the writers have wildly varying degrees of support among other Hollywood unions. 47% of IATSE members polled categorized the strike as “tactically a mistake”; only 15% of SAG felt the same. You can download a PDF of the full survey at the above link.
Meanwhile, talks are set to resume this morning. The Hollywood Reporter has a primer on where the issues stand.
Box office: Enchanted made $50 million this weekend, This Christmas’ counter-programming gambit was good for $27 million on half as many screens, while August Rush and Love in the Time of Cholera disappointed.
More interesting: Andrew Wagner’s Starting Out in the Evening opened to double the per-screen average of Todd Haynes’ I’m Not There. Variety spun this news under the headline, “Are art films out of touch?” In the other box office story linked above, the same publication allowed Bob Weinstein to get away with characterizing The Mist’s 8th-place opening as “a base hit.” I’m not saying Variety’s bashing the rest of the market with broad generalizations in order to let The Weinstein Curse continue on unmarked upon, but…okay, that’s exactly what I’m saying.

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Hollywood, Indies

Strike Day 10: Trade Roughage 11/14/07

By Karina Longworth posted 11 months ago

A twist in the strike saga: the AMPTP’s lead negotiator Nick Counter has accused the WGA of creating a blacklist by “using fear and intimidation to control its membership.” WGA reps were quick to refute that charge, but the writers maintain they will not break the picket line until the studios respond to their final offer on internet residuals. “This is our last chance to get residuals for work on the Internet. If we don’t do it now, they’ll never give it to us,” said writer/showrunner Jack Kenny. Meanwhile, SAG officer Valerie Harper hammered home the point that this is not a Hollywood issue, but a labor issue: “A lot of this is going on in our country — doing business cheaper and decimating the middle class,” Harper said. “In the future, this strike will be a historic moment for unions.”
Neil LaBute has been hired to write a remake of Truffaut’s La Femme d’a cote (AKA The Woman Next Door) for Taylor Hackford to direct at New Line. Because LaBute, whose last released film was a disastrous remake of The Wicker Man, technically cannot write the script until after the strike, it could be years before this project actually comes together. Also, Hackford has to finish that movie with his wife in the brothel.
Ira Levin, the author of the novels that inspired films like Rosemary’s Baby, The Stepford Wives, and one of my favorite guilty pleasures, Sliver, died on Monday at age 78.

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Hollywood

Strike Hysteria, Chapter 2: Trade Roughage, 08/08/07

By Karina Longworth posted 1 year ago

The Hollywood Reporter has two full stories this morning on the apparent hysteria leading up to an expected November writers strike, and a possible actors and directors strike next June. Borys Kit says agents are scrambling to get A-listers booked solid for the next ten months; Carl DiOrio warns that the studios’ effort to ramp up pre-strike production is almost sure to lead to a decline in overall quality.
One of those A-listers apparently has no intention of working for the sake of working. While his compatriots suffer through strike fever, George Clooney has signed on to produce and narrate a documentary on Darfur for HBO.
Lured by the state’s tax incentives, Pacifica Ventures is planning to build a $75 million film studio in Pennsylvania.
General Motors has teamed up with Women in Film to offer a grant to five emerging female filmmakers. According to Variety, the grant recipients will be “chosen by a WIF committee of professional filmmakers and entertainment industry executives,” and in addition to a cash award, they’ll also have access to “a six-day, full-immersion mentoring program.” The application deadline is August 31, and more information can be found here.