Wherein I Say Bold And Stupid Things And Regret None of It Because Hey, That's Just How I Roll.

I AM A QUOTE WHORE. If you know of, or are starting some sort of twelve step program, I encourage you to send me the literature, with one very important caveat: I renounce and regret nothing. Bwwaah ha ha.

From Saturday's Globe and Mail:

What the frak is going on?
By MARSHA LEDERMAN
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
November 16, 2007 at 11:20 PM EST
VANCOUVER — It's a sci-fi drug trafficked by diehard space-show junkies and mainstream viewers alike, and chances are someone you know is already hooked. It takes two words to separate the addicts from the innocent: Battlestar Galactica. The tipoff is a hungry look in their eye, the one that appears with a chance to debate the Cylon wars, and what they symbolize in the post-9/11 world.

That's right, Battlestar Galactica. True, this is a “re-imagined” version of the original 1978 cheese fest, but can a remake of anything that starred Lorne Greene really be called one of the most important television shows of our time?

What the frak is going on?

The contemporary Battlestar Galactica (or BSG to hard-core fans) is indeed based on the original 1978 series (which starred Greene as William Adama), but the re-imagined version has emerged as a critical hit and developed a strong cult following since its debut in 2005, following a 2003 miniseries. It's also a favourite with the intelligentsia, the kind of people who wouldn't necessarily identify themselves as sci-fi fanatics. The program has won a prestigious Peabody Award, been profiled in The New Yorker, been named the best TV show of 2005 by Time Magazine and been called “the smartest and toughest show on TV” in Rolling Stone magazine.

Toronto TV writer and blogger Denis McGrath (heywriterboy.blogspot.com), who helped create the Canadian Space channel, says the show is capital-I Influential – and Important. “Thirty years from now, any scholar looking for a portrait of the mindset of contemporary America in the early 21st century will probably take at least a look at TV shows from our time,” he says. “And if they really want to know what we were thinking and arguing about and fighting our way through, there are two shows that will help them the most. The first is The Sopranos. The second is Battlestar Galactica.”

Feel free to read the rest of the article here. Make special note where I compare BSG fans to heroin addicts. Hi Mom. Aren't you proud?

BSG: Razor airs in Canada on the Space Channel (Shout out to my OG SPACE Peeps: Simon, Michelle, Mark, Khaleel, Gord, Timmy, Irene, Nat (close enough), and Isme too!) November 24 at 9PM. Watch or don't, bitches, we're not esplainin anymore!

I Still Believe In A Place Called Hope.

FROM VARIETY:

WRITERS, STUDIOS AGREE TO TALK
Negotiations to begin Nov. 26
By DAVE MCNARY
Studios and networks will resume negotiations with striking writers on Nov. 26.
The WGA remains on strike. The companies recently dropped their insistence that the strike had to stop, at least temporarily, as a condition of restarting negotiations.

The Friday night announcement came on the 12th day of the strike in the form of a joint statement from the Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers.

Both sides have agreed to a news blackout.

Silver Lining?

AFTER TEN FULL days of striking, some surprising things have happened. The first, and best, to me anyway, is the polls that show that public support is firmly on the side of the striking writers. That's heartening to hear.

But you know what's even better? Those videos at United Hollywood. Specifically, the show-specific ones. Something hit me yesterday, watching the latest one featuring Ali LeRoi and some of the cast of Everybody Hates Chris:



It's raucous. It's scabrous and high-energy. It flirts with being just on the edge...I mean, Todd Bridges?

You know what else? It feels like the show.

Then there's "The Office is Closed."



A little laconic. Clever. Witty and smart. The run on "promotions" is joyful and snarky at the same time. The whole thing feels kind of like a good episode of...The Office.

You see where I'm going with this?

One more...from those crazy Daily Show writers:



And then there's these guys... a little weirder, a little hit and miss, sure, but man, wouldn't it be cool if they were animated?



There's certain things you sign up for when you become a TV writer. You know that you're going to be anonymous, and that people are going to focus all the love they have on the actors. You know that people who don't know how things work are going to give way more credit than they should to the directors, cause that's how it works in film. You know that people in that great swath of the heartland just assume that the Actors came up with that line or this joke cause it seemed so natural, so...them.

You know all that. But still...

Then something extraordinary and unusual happens. And you see writers where they're not supposed to be, out in the sunlight, dorkily walking around, and they make all these little videos, and there it is: the essential character of the show, right there, personified.

It takes a whole bunch of people working very hard at highly specialized task to make a show work, to make a show good.

But first comes the show's spirit.

And right now that spirit's out there, somewhere in a red shirt, carrying a sign. I'm glad that America gets to see that.

Goodbye, Young Fella.

A LIVABLE SOCIETY is built on small things. That's something I firmly believe. Everyone wants to talk about the big stuff, the grand idea, but I think the further we get away from human-scaled things, the less we connect with one another, and the harder it is to relate.

They say that the secret to radio was thinking that you were out there talking to one person -- one person only. I kind of think that way about my writing, too. I imagine an audience of one -- what do I want them to feel?

But this isn't a writing post. Well, not exactly. This is a post about a man who was never famous, who not a lot of people knew well -- none of us even knew his real name.

But he made a difference. By selling hot dogs.

Ronald Alexander, better known as Ernie, Ryerson University's corner hot dog vendor for over 25 years, has died. He was 80 years old.

He retired 18 months ago from his familiar perch at the corner of Yonge and Gould Streets, just down from Sam the Record Man -- now gone too.

It's the small things that matter. Goodbye Ernie. Thanks for everything.

Here's a piece I wrote on this blog back in March 2006, when Ernie retired.

Do You Know This Man?

His name is Ernie.

Well, not really. That's just a nickname. But Ernie has been a fixture at the corner of Yonge & Gould Streets in Downtown Toronto for 25 years.

In my yooot, like thousands of other Ryerson University students, I would pass by Ernie's cart every day. His hotdogs were good, and they were cheap. He gave a bursary to students low on cash. He told corny jokes and played the best of the Village People. And he was there. Always.
Well, he's not going to be there anymore. Ernie retired last week, at the age of 78 -- for the second time. The first time he retired, it was as an electrical engineer in fibre optics. He traded fibre for processed meat, and the bellies and hearts of Downtown Toronto students were all the better for it.

There's a lot I'll miss about Ernie. Not the least of which was his penchant for greeting me -- every time -- with a delighted, "Hello, young fella!"

Now, I'm sure he greeted every "young fella" that way. But that's not the way I remember it. Not long after graduating Ryerson, after working in the industry for a few years, one of my writing mentors lured me back to start teaching part time. I was 25 -- not that much older than the students I was teaching. Well, the march of time is cruel -- because over the next 10+ years, I got another year older and they stayed exactly the same age. I can't believe more teachers don't go batshit crazy. My teaching experience now has pretty much left me with the inability to remember a name. That's what having to learn forty new names every three months and then never see them again does to you. But when I passed Ernie's cart, rushing back to my day job, or post-day job, walking down the street after class trying to figure which coffee shop would bear my writing burden today, I was always up for an Ernie dog. And I was always a young fella.

When you spend a lot of time inside your own head, and when you live alone, to boot -- it's easy to lose perspective. I've been in a bit of a melancholy downtick, lately. Nothing too serious. The kind of thing that you know you're going to bounce back from, you just aren't too sure of the timing. (In fact, sometime in the next few days, I think I'm going to have news. Good news.)

Anyway, when I'm feeling the mean reds, I think of Ernie - a guy who survived leukemia, who walked away from one life, and found another. Who always had a kind word, and who never failed to call out to a young fella who was probably taking himself too seriously.

Anyway, Ernie, goodbye and thanks for the sauteed onions at no charge. That's the kind of value you don't find in Toronto.

What Can You Do if You're Outside the US?

OVER THE LAST week or so, I've gotten periodic emails and seen various message trackbacks to this blog that basically ask the same thing, "What Can We Do?"

Some are fans, looking to show support to striking WGA writers. Some are Canadians who wonder if writing a letter to our networks here would do any good.

There have been incredible fan-run initiatives set up, like Fans 4 Writers. There, too, people are saying things like, "I'm not in the U.S., I'm in Canada," or "I'm in the UK, what can I do?"

Well now we've got a bit of an answer. The Writers' Guild of Canada sent out this advisory this morning:

This week, the International Affiliation of Writers Guilds (IAWG) met in Montreal. With the meeting held in Canada, it is an excellent opportunity for the WGC to be well represented – participating in the discussions are WGC president Rebecca Schechter, executive director, Maureen Parker, director of industrial relations, Laurie Channer and WGC council member Jill Golick. Given the current situation of our sister guild in the United States, it is a particularly important moment for the guilds internationally to come together on issues and show support.

This morning, the group issued a joint communiqué in support of the WGA – and announced an International Day of Solidarity on Wednesday, November 28. You will find that release attached and pasted in below. We will give you more details about how that Day of Solidarity will take shape on the WGC side in the days to come.

You know too well that it is a rare moment when screenwriters are in the spotlight and attention is being paid to the work that you do and the conditions within which you do it. It is the opportune time to remind the public that entertainment is big business and that writers deserve to share in the revenues generated by the content they create – no matter how that content may be delivered.

And here is the release that went out this morning:

“Their fight is our fight”

International Affiliation of Writers Guilds Supports WGA Strike

For immediate release

Montreal – November 15, 2007 – Leaders of major writers’ guilds from around the world – representing more than 21,000 screenwriters internationally – pledge to take action in support of the WGA strike against multi-national media conglomerates.

At the annual International Affiliation of Writers Guilds’ meeting in Montreal, Canada, screenwriters announced an International Day of Solidarity on Wednesday, November 28, 2007.

Writers will demonstrate in Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, English and French Canada, United Kingdom, Mexico and France.

“Their fight is our fight,” asserts Rebecca Schechter, President, Writers Guild of Canada. “Screenwriters around the world are entitled to receive their fair share of revenues from the internet, and that is what our American colleagues are fighting for.”

Katharine Way, Chair, Writers Guild of Great Britain, argues that “The future of our industry is shifting toward new media. Writers have always had to fight for a small share of the revenues generated from their work and this case is no different.”

Audrey O’Reilly, Chair, Irish Playwrights and Screenwriters Guild, added that “Our solidarity means that no self-respecting screenwriter in any country will undermine the US strike. The overwhelming majority of our members will never take work from striking American colleagues because the fight now taking place in the US is a fight for screenwriters across the globe.”

Tim Pyre, President, Australian Writers Guild, says that “the IAWG urges the international corporate giants to share just a few more drops from their buckets of money with the creators – without whose work their TV shows, movies, webisodes and downloads would not exist. The networks and studios must return to the negotiating table without delay.”

The International Day of Solidarity on Wednesday, November 28, 2007, will demonstrate the resolve of the worldwide screenwriting community.

The International Affiliation of Writers Guilds (IAWG) is an international body representing guilds of professional screenwriters. The IAWG works to further the cause of screenwriters worldwide by lobbying governments to adopt writer-friendly legislation and through collective action, mutual support and common representation internationally. The IAWG includes representatives from the Australian Writers Guild, the Irish Playwrights and Screenwriters Guild, the New Zealand Writers Guild, the Société des auteurs de radio, télévision et cinéma (SARTEC), the Writers Guild of America, East, the Writers Guild of America, West, the Writers Guild of Canada, and the Writers Guild of Great Britain.

The Writers Guild of Canada (WGC) represents more than 1,800 English-language professional screenwriters across Canada who create the distinctly Canadian entertainment we enjoy on our televisions, movie screens, radios and computers – such as dramatic TV series and movies, feature films, documentaries, animation programs, comedy and variety series, children's and educational programming, radio drama, corporate videos and digital media productions.

So there you have it. If you're in the U.K., or Australia, Ireland, New Zealand, Mexico, France, or Canada -- Quebec and TROC (the rest of Canada. I swear, that's an acronym that gets thrown around here) and you want to show your support for the WGA, circle that date. November 28th.

And yes, I have heard from WGC members who point out that the WGA has not exactly been helpful in the past to the WGC in supporting Canadian writers' issues. That's true. But this is not the time for that discussion.

I'll post details here for the Canadian protests as they become available.

The Daily Show, Picket Line Edition

AH, THE DAILY SHOW. Sniff. Jason Ross, Daily Show Writer, does a not-too-bad job stepping into Jon Stewart's chair in this Strike Line video. This was obviously worked on by all the writers, and it's interesting because it actually does really remind you of the construction of the show: it's funny, it goes somewhere, the jokes develop. Jeez, it's almost like you have to be skilled to somehow come up with this stuff. Watch til the end for the cameo by John Oliver.

Two Out of Three!

As originally reported in the L.A. Times, and in this morning's Globe:

According to the L.A. Times, a survey by Pepperdine University's Graziadio School of Business and Management indicates that the public in the U.S. is overwhelmingly in support of the striking writers. Apparently 63 per cent of those surveyed said they were "more inclined to side with writers" in the labour dispute with broadcasters and major studios. And the survey indicated that 47 per cent thought writers deserved the largest share of residual payments, compared with 26 per cent for actors, 25 per cent for producers and 2 per cent for directors. The writers are winning the PR war, obviously.

Q on the WGA Strike

THE Q PODCAST featuring my conversation with Jian and Colbert Report Senior Wrier Barry Julien is now available on Itunes, or you can click right here.

What if NOBODY Could Figure It Out?

North of the border, an article appeared in the Globe and Mail this morning showing huge faultlines between the Canadian Producers Association and other members of the technology/new media sector.

A rift has erupted in Canada's new-media sector, highlighting the growing tension over emerging technologies that stretches from Hollywood to Ottawa.

After feuding with other members of the Canadian Interactive Alliance, the Canadian Film and Television Production Association (CFTPA) walked away from the alliance Tuesday, vowing to set out on its own.

The breakdown comes at a crucial time for new-media issues. The Alliance was formed five years ago at the request of the federal government, which called on the fragmented sector to provide a single voice to Ottawa on industry issues.

Phil Alden Robinson is right. This is simply a generational issue -- a once in 20 years fight. It's a fight that's happening, or going to happen everywhere...which is why foreign writers in the Writers Guild of Canada, and the Writers Guild of Great Britain (who are all meeting in Montreal this week) stand with you -- we don't oppose you, and we're not looking to cadge any work as scabs.

Anyone who does is not part of my industry, and is not someone I will work with in the future. More immediately: there are Canadians walking the line down in L.A. every day.

To anyone who heard me on CBC's Q yesterday, I apologize for being a little 'off.' I did think that the interview should probably, you know, feature the guy who was actually out walking the picket line more.

I don't know if it made it to air, but the last thing I said was, "Good Luck, Barry." And I meant it. Barry Julien, Colbert Report writer, shared his experiences.

By the way -- I do get paid every time I appear on Q. Not a lot, but a little.  But since I'm Calvinist in every way about this strike -- I will NOT make money off this situation, I want you all to know that I'm going to be making another donation to the Actor's Fund, equivalent to what I'm paid for my appearance.  The Actor's Fund is a fund that can help any of the other people hurt by this strike -- below the line crew people too -- writer's assistants, etc. It's an organization with a long history, if you want to show you care. Check out their page here.

I'm cooking up a post with some further thoughts on Jim Henshaw's what you can do opus.  I don't know if I'll get to it today.

Meanwhile, everywhere's posted this video. But just in case you're the one person who hasn't seen it. Here's what this is about. It's a four minute history of the WGA and their strike actions:

Wow.

THIS IS JUST too freaky, even for me.




They're picketing in Second Life.

Brrrr.

Ten Ways You Can Make a Difference

MAYBE YOU'RE CANADIAN, or maybe you feel you have no conduit into the fight. You're 1000 miles from the nearest picket line. What can you do to show your suppport for the WGA? How can you stand up to the Big 6?

Go read Uncle Jim. He's got some very cagey things to say, and some concrete suggestions too.

You're welcome.

Huju callin' a Producer, man?

WOW. THIS is unbelievable.

Today, a group of over EIGHTY independent Hollywood Producers sent a letter to Variety complaining about one key editorial choice in this strike.

Specifically, they don't want the AMPTP to be referred to as "producers" anymore.

November 12, 2007

Dear Editors,

The public has been led to believe that we independent producers are sitting opposite the writers at the bargaining table (or across the picket lines). It is not true.

We respectfully ask that your publications and reporters cease referring to the ongoing negotiations between the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers as between “writers and producers.”

The Alliance represents the studios, the networks, and the international conglomerates that own them, not working producers. Creative producers are not directly involved in this dispute: we do not receive any residuals, nor are we stakeholders in the studio profits (excepting where some powerful producers do have back-end holdings in particular studio shows and films, just as do powerful actors, writers, and directors). We do not dispute the need for residuals, including those from DVDs and new media. Residuals are important and significant revenues. It is only fair that the creators of films and television share in the proceeds from all of the ways the product they create may be exploited. We support our wonderful writers, directors, and actors. We are also happy to pay benefits to the fantastic tradespeople on our films.

It is entirely inaccurate to equate us with the entity (or entities) in negotiations opposite the writers. Stories and opinion pieces in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Variety, The Hollywood Reporter, on television, and on NPR have almost all referenced “the producers” when they should, in all accuracy, refer to the studios, networks, and conglomerates. Independent producers have been inaccurately referred to as represented by AMPTP (by almost all publications, television, and radio outlets). We have been further characterized as “greedy” (a letter in the Los Angeles Times), and even “Scrooge-like” (a reputable columnist in The New York Times. These last characterizations are particularly galling. The work of independent producers is typically a creative endeavor that is widely understood to be an enormous financial gamble.

It serves the studios’ interests to pretend to represent individual producers instead of corporate entities. We would ask that you, as responsible members of the media, stop abetting this charade and call upon your reporters to cease equating independent producers (who are not negotiators or direct stakeholders in this process, and the vast majority of whom side with the writers) with international conglomerates.

Sincerely,

etc etc.

It's official. The studios are losing the P.R. war, and they are losing it badly. First the showrunners, then the public. The AMPTP took out full page ads in Variety and the Hollywood Reporter today, trying to make their case. This, while polls show public sympathy in Los Angeles and elsewhere starting to shift dramatically to the writers. Sixty-nine percent support the writers in a town that's going to be hardest hit by the strike. That's astounding.

TV blogs call for a "Dark Tuesday Day of Action" support. There it is -- the new medium everybody's fighting over is taking sides. And surprise surprise, it's not with the big media conglomerates.

But while a lot of the house organs like Variety and the L.A. Times try to float stories about the below the line crew who are starting to feel the pinch, other stories leak out about blackmail tactics the conglomerates are trying to use -- like threatening Jay Leno with the layoff of his whole staff if he won't cross the picket line and return to work.

NBC is trying to strong arm Jay Leno back to the “Tonight Show,” the very same program they are basically forcing him to leave against his own will in a year and a half.
The funnyman with the heart of gold has been supporting his writers by walking out in solidarity and not crossing the picket line.
But NBC has informed all non-writing staff that they will be fired at the end of next week if Leno doesn’t return.
“I talk to Jay every day, and he will not be the first [late-night host] to cross the picket line,” said Tonight Show head writer Joe Medeiros, a strike captain for the Writers Guild.
So, in an attempt to save people’s jobs and lure Leno back, NBC is “looking into” the possibility of having guest hosts fill in while Jay is gone.

Nice. Nice. (Remember, if you want to help below-the-line people hurt by the strike there's a way to do that.)

But to my mind that little bombshell of a letter above is a watershed moment. If you can't hide behind the "producer" title -- if, in fact, even the Producers think the writers are getting a raw deal -- then who's left on your side?

Oh sure, there's batshit Joel Surnow. Look what he said to the Washington Times:

"Hollywood's not being held hostage," Surnow told the Times. "I think (the studios) are going to break the guild.

Ohhhh, I get it. It's about Union Breaking! Wow, way to make the subtext text, with that usual 24 style subtlety. Well, Joel, your fellow Producers don't have your six on this one. And your show has sucked balls for two whole years now, so pipe down.

Who else? Well, I guess if Joel and the AMPTP want real producer-cover for support, they could always turn to all those Canadian producers who see nothing but opportunity in the strike. Though, uh, I wouldn't advise it. (Guys, seriously, Just stay out of it. You don't have to give a quote every time.)

So, if Variety goes with the request, and starts talking about "The Alliance," instead of "the Producers" is that really the best image? Oh, sure, if you're a Star Wars fan, maybe you think Rebel Alliance and not, you know, fascism. But FOX looks a lot less like Luke Skywalker and a lot more like, well, NewsCorp!

Heyyyyy.

You know what, the hell with it. I'm not calling them "the Producers" anymore -- the Producers' Guild is right. And the Alliance definitely doesn't work, either.

Let's call them the Axis. You know, the 6 big powers. The..Axis. It's got a nice ring to it, don'tcha think?

No?

Okay, okay. Hey shareholders, Ad agencies -- you like the way this is going? Pick up the phone. Tell the AMPTP (NOT the producers) -- to get back to the table and start talking real.

Q Roo Koo Koo, Q Roo Koo Koo

SORRY. LONG DAY. I'm punchy.

Well, it's happened. I've started to get the emails from the snarks asking, "could you please write about something other than the damn strike?"

And the answer, mostly, for now anyway, is "Sorry, Chester. I really can't."

Since last Monday, I haven't watched any over-the-air TV. I did rewatch the pilot for My So Called Life -- which, if anything, seems even more perfectly constructed now than it did years ago. I've also been catching up on 2nd season eps of How I Met Your Mother and a bunch of movies I have on DVD. Hey, they're already bought.

Tomorrow I will be on Q, on CBC Radio. I'm going to be paired with a Senior Writer for The Colbert Report. I'll be talking about the impact the strike could have on Canadian writers -- and why WGC-only writers have a dog in this hunt, too.

Here's a sneak preview: I won't be framing the strike as a "golden opportunity" for Canadian writers or producers.

The Big Ten and The Big Lie

REMEMBER WHEN The Big Ten referred to college sports? Now it refers to where you get your news. That's right. Just ten companies control most of what you see and hear every day. Wonder why you're not maybe hearing the full story on Global Warming or Iraq or even this little strikey here? Big Ten.

Marc Crispin Miller takes you behind The Big Ten.

*now here's the punchline: that article's five years old. It's gotten worse.

Oh, and when it comes to the WGA strike, there's really 6 companies that matter. You know, all the ones who can't pay writers for the Internet because they can't figure out how to make any money yet, right? Watch and learn, skeeziks. Watch and learn.

Don't Forget the Lipstick and the Chapstick

IN AN AP ARTICLE reprinted today's Globe and Mail about how writers are handling their sudden downtime, Deuce Bigalo: Male Gigolo (I know, I know) writer Harris Goldberg has this pithy piece of advice:

Not all writers have their complete attention on striking. Besides jamming with his band, a group called Oliver Twist in which he plays guitar, Goldberg said he's funnelling some creativity into scoping out a future wife on the picket lines. "I've eyed a few," Goldberg said. "But it's hard to throw on the charm while you're holding a picket sign."

Come on. Get working on those residuals.

Your Monday Morning Reading

FIRST OF ALL, John August has a very clear, very straightforward take on "Why Writers Get Residuals." I'm not even going to excerpt any of it. You just need to go and read the whole thing now. We'll wait.

Okay. That was good, huh?

Secondly, House writer Doris Egan has a lovely long essay up about writing in Hollywood today:

There is one place left in the world where some writers can make a decent living, some of the time. That place is Hollywood, California, and the Hollywoodesque enclaves of film and TV around the world.

It hasn't always been easy. Bob Carroll and Madelyn Pugh wrote the first four seasons of I Love Lucy. As you read this, that show is playing somewhere in the world, but Carroll and Pugh never saw a dime of residuals from the huge amount of money their scripts made. That money still rains down today on a huge conglomerate, where no one in the executive offices has any connection whatsoever with the series, let alone contributed to its success. It's simply free money for them, forever and ever. This is one reason I would go back in a time machine and stop Hollywood writers from giving up copyright, for with copyright went respect and fair treatment; but you can never wrestle from the hands of a corporation that which they now believe is theirs. Carroll kidded an interviewer, before he died at the age of 87: "If I had residuals, would I be here?" But this was a business where Jack Benny didn't give his writers credits on his show, because it was believed the audience thought actors and comedians made everything up on the spot. It was a business where, one ancient director told me, when a movie stopped for the night, the crew could be locked up in a barn till daylight.

A lot of people went through hard times getting the WGA and IATSE and the other unions together, and putting an end to horror stories like that. The horror stories now are coming from a different angle: from the age of giant conglomerates. The AMPTP is often referred to as "the producers," but they are not. They are huge corporations which own many different things. And the executives the Guild is striking against are not the executives we work with on films and TV shows. This all basically comes down to six CEOs and a corporate culture that seeks to maximize profit as though those profits did not emanate from people actually making things. There is a big disconnect between the people doing the making and the ones keeping the books, and there's little incentive to run things reasonably in a world where the salary of a single CEO surpasses the entire amount of DVD residuals paid to the entire Guild. And where none of these companies will open their books so their accounting can be examined.

The companies are both answerable to no one and wildly bloated; it's not unusual, in launching a TV show, to get notes from twelve or more executives, some of which are mutually contradictory, but all of which must be obeyed. (There was a day when notes were few, and left to the discretion of the executive producer. That day is no more.) The result, as I have personally witnessed, is often incoherence. Then too, when twelve or more people read something, anything non-generic will "bump" one of them. This is a simple statistical fact, not a reflection on the executives involved -- give a script to any twelve people, including other writers, and the results will be the same. It won't be the same person bumped each time; but by the time your script is ready to shoot, it will have been smoothed down, like a rock under a waterfall, till all that's left is what's expected. (And yet, it's still incoherent. This is not an easy result to achieve: it takes the work of many people.) I'm lucky in that I work on a show that's up and running, whose executives go out of their way to give us space to create, and trust that our mistakes will mostly be small ones. But after ten years in this business, I can tell you that it's by no means something you can count on. The structure of this contraption is just too unwieldy.

Here's something else you should know: writers are not famous for their self-esteem. I'm sure there must be some out there with a sense of entitlement, but I haven't met them. I have never heard a discussion of salary, on any show, that didn't have writers pointing to average compensation across the country and saying we were lucky people, at least this year. (Just as I've never heard writers discuss actors and casting without sympathy for what the actors go through.) Writers are very, very aware of what the world is like -- what's more, we tend to be vaguely grateful to be paid at all, because it's for writing, and we've been beaten down by the world to think that isn't a serious and valuable thing. (By the way, I'm not at all sure this understanding goes up to the CEO's office; how can it, when that CEO can be handed sixty million dollars just for quitting? Someday I must tell you the story of the famous exec who said, "Why not make this character middle-class? Let's say he makes $300,000 a year -- " and the writers all stared at him.)

Egan points out something that you should remember, and remember well. All of the unreasonable money we're talking about here, the total money it would cost to give writers what they're asking for on DVD and the Internet, is less than the salary of one of the six CEO's of the mega-conglomerates who have forced this strike. One salary, or an entire community of creative professionals who get to be middle class and who create things you love.

What will it take to embarrass the Peter Chernins et al to do the right thing? Are they capable of shame anymore?

(H/T to DeeKay for the links)

No. It Doesn't.

VARIETY, the house rag of the AMPTP, snuck a doozer up late Friday afternoon:

Strike grants opportunity for Canada

Producers scurry to fill the union gap

By BRENDAN KELLY

MONTREAL -- Some Canuck producers have seized on the WGA strike as an opportunity while stations are trying to figure out how to fill holes left by U.S. shows that have gone dark. If the strike drags on, it will also put a damper on Yank shooting.

"There are obviously some opportunities for companies that can develop and produce programming outside the American guild system," says John Morayniss, CEO of Canadian prodco Blueprint Ent.

"The longer the strike lasts, the hungrier the U.S. buyers are going to be for alternative types of programming. And the Canadian companies have the best opportunity of anyone outside the U.S., because we speak the same language, we have a similar culture and we're close to the U.S."

Morayniss says his company has already had preliminary discussions with several American networks about developing shows using Canadian writers.

Let's unpack this a bit. First, to the striking WGA members, I say this: don't worry. Brendan Kelly has it wrong. Very Wrong.

And unless I miss my guess, Blueprint Entertainment, being based both in L.A. and Toronto, is, in fact, a struck company. So no WGC member looking to stay in good graces with our union is going to consider this kind of work. Canadian producers can be as clueless about this as they want - but the WGC has been clear: Don't work for struck companies.

Second, every Canadian writer should well know that scabbing during this strike means being blackballed forever when it ends.

That's persona non grata in the U.S. I frequently tell young talent here that the chronic instability of the Canadian system means that they should consider relocating to the U.S. before they have the encumbrances of wives, kids, houses, and dogs. But this is not the way to do that. I have a hard time believing that any Canadian writer with a soupcon of true talent wouldn't also have the smarts to realize that this "opportunity" comes wrapped (in Variety?) with Dead Fish.

Yeah, there's a possibility that some Canadian shows that are already made might sell, but I'll believe that when I see it. I don't need "my profile raised" that way.

If anything, Variety misses the point entirely when they talk of the "opportunities," to come out of the strike. The article goes on to run down how Canadian Nets are revamping their schedules. But yet to be made? The point that anywhere else in the world, this would be at best a minor disruption, because broadcasters would turn to their own programming. In a way, the strike merely raises the uncomfortable truth that Canadian channels mostly merely duplicate the American channels -- channels that are, in fact, available on cable in this country.

Canadian writers stand with you. I hear reports on the line every day from Canadians -- some not even dual WGC/WGA members -- who have walked the line. If I manage to get down to L.A. or NY before Christmas -- which is entirely possible -- I'll be volunteering myself.

And if you guys need a picket set up in Toronto, well, we'll see what we can do.

Despite what Variety says, we are all united.

Helping

DIANE KRISTINE...oh sure, she's a pill sometimes with her, "why do you whine so much" this, and "why should we care about" that's ... but she's also one smart cookie.

Yeah, the whole "rich writers" thing is bullshit, and yeah, it's not like IATSE stagehands who are striking Broadway shows are any less culpable than writers for throwing people out of work -- but the fact remains that there are a lot of crew people, office workers and non-writers who are going to start feeling the heat of this strike very, very soon.

If you're a person with a conscience, and you love tv, and maybe you're feeling a little bit like maybe those writers are a bit...I don't know, hard to love, Diane passes along a solution today:

From CSI's David Rambo:
The WGA currently has a $12 million strike fund. However, the people who will need assistance as this drags on longer are those in film and TV who don't have access to the strike fund: the office assistants, crew members and actors. They will really need the help to be able to continue in support of our strike, and there's no fund for them. There is, however, a wonderful 125-year old nonprofit organization that provides direct, confidential assistance to all entertainment professionals in need, such as those I just mentioned. It's called the Actors Fund, and you can find out more or make a donation through their website.

If you do donate, let the Actors Fund know that your contribution is in support of those affected by the writers strike.

What a fine idea. I just made my donation. Take a bow, Diane, you delightfully prickly so-and-so.

Sacrifice

I MISSED 11AM, but still.

There are things more important, even to me, than a bunch of striking tv and film writers.

There are sacrifices made that are worthy, and just. And even when there's doubt about the cause, there is still the unassailable integrity of the loss.

For those who put themselves through hell and the great failure of human compassion, there is the countervailing virtue: sacrifice.

Thank you for incurring a debt we will never repay.

May we have the courage to pick up the torch.

May we find the wisdom to avoid the flame.

EW Explains the Plumber and the Water

THE HARDEST THING about the current strike for many writers has not necessarily been getting the word out, it's been crafting that word in such a way that the public will give a damn.

The problem with screenwriting, and screenwriters, of course, is that we don't deal in direct political or policy ideas very well. When you write about an issue in TV drama and comedy, the training says to tack away from it. To be elliptical, or to use a metaphor that comes at it from the side. We're all about trying to go for verisimilitude, and rarely in life do people make concise, easy-to-understand and relate-to arguments. The guy who came closest in the last few years is probably the early Aaron Sorkin-era West Wing, and even he had disappeared entirely up his own colon by those sad, dying, last days of Studio 60.

The theater allows for a bit more polemic. But even there it's a delicate mix. This past summer, I took in a performance of Saint Joan at the Shaw Festival in Niagara on the Lake, Ontario. It was enjoyable, and compelling -- but even then, the Shavian point and counterpoint does go on a bit, doesn't it? One of the clever things Shaw does in Saint Joan is to make the most small-minded, eager to burn, fundamentalist judge the first to show the horror and remorse when the burning of Joan of Arc doesn't conform to his early, hardened, hardly-thought-about positions.

But in the theater of the absurd this strike has become, it's doubtful that Nick Counter is going to have a 3AM moment when he realizes what utter, unconscionable asshattery he's been spewing. So let's just take the theater part of this strike off the table.

What does that leave? Print.

Ay, there's the rub. For the most part, print reportage of the issues behind the strike has been lacking. The studio's propaganda claims have been posted and reposted -- to paraphrase Twain, they've managed to flit around the world while the WGA side hasn't even got its boots on.

Part of this is probably some sort of corporate lethargy -- people writing the management line because that's what America has become in our cowed, "dont' call me a liberal" age. And part of it might be the uncomfortable animus held by print scribes toward their picketing brethren. In honor of Russell Smith, let's call this the "gold buillion" problem.

Well, now a fine scribe name of Mark Harris has gone and fixed all that with a pithy, excellent article on EW.com. Harris runs down the catalogue of mistakes made by the WGA in getting their side out, pre-strike (he also manages to make a very apt comparison between the WGA and the Democratic Party.)

It's a shame that the WGA so neglected its own image in the weeks leading up to the strike, since it has led too many observers to embrace the laziest kind of neutrality — a position that sneers at the hyperbole of both sides, and in so doing suggests that the writers and producers are somehow equally far from reason — that a magical midpoint of compromise could be found if everyone would just calm down. That's not what's going on here. The writers may be conflicted and prickly, but they're also right. The studios and networks are wrong. And yes, when you strip everything else away, it really is that simple.

Complaints about tactics, timing, and the problematic personalities at the negotiating table shouldn't obscure the fact that the position of the AMPTP (the producers' negotiating alliance) has been, and remains, ethically indefensible on the two issues that matter most — residuals and new media. Let's look at residuals first. Currently, for every dollar spent on a DVD, writers receive about one-third of a penny. They would like, instead, to receive about two-thirds of a penny. The AMPTP's first response to this was to waste weeks by advocating a complete abolition of the residual system. Why, they argued, should writers get paid anything for their work after it's released? Studio chiefs who are smart enough to know better even hauled out a tired old maxim attributed to the late MCA titan Lew Wasserman — ''My plumber doesn't charge me every time I flush the toilet'' — and repeated it in perfect Karl Rove everybody-stay-on-message lockstep.

Ugh. Lines like that give you a taste of what the entertainment world will be like if management ends up doing its own writing. Not to belabor an already disgusting analogy, but writers — and directors and actors, who have their own renegotiations coming up — aren't the plumber: They're the water. Without them, nothing goes anywhere, and you end up with a toilet full of...well, let's just say ''reruns.''

In making this why-should-we-keep-paying argument, the AMPTP blithely ignored a century of copyright law that grants creative writers in every other field — novelists, composers, lyricists, playwrights — ongoing income from their work based on its sales. The studios and networks claim that the difference is that writers for film and TV don't hold copyrights to their own work. That's a fair legal distinction, but a morally illegitimate one, since writers for movies and television do the same kind of work, face the same kind of chronically unsteady income, and depend in the same way on income from good years to tide them through bad ones.

It's also an irrelevant distinction -- in Canada writers do hold the copyrights to their scripts, and it changes nothing. We don't earn residuals, either.

Lordyloo how I wish the WGA had gotten something that straightforward out on Day One. But there you go. And the whole, "I'm mad at both sides" thing IS intellectually lazy. Yes, this is about TV. It's not about getting food to market, or making sure that workers don't die in industrial accidents. But it's also about something that the average North American does for over 28 hours a week. That's a big chunk of your life, not just mine.

Oh, look at me, going on and on. Better to give a little more of the floor over to Harris:

If you run a company that produces written entertainment, you either believe that writers have value, or you don't. If you do, the only decent thing to do is to recognize the legitimacy of paying writers a percentage — yes, a whole two-thirds of a penny — as long as the companies that own their work continue to derive income from it. What's not decent is to have spent valuable negotiating time floating a specious theory of big-picture bullcrap about how the residual system is ''antiquated'' without offering any alternative compensation in its place. (Since the producers abruptly dropped this idea, one has to wonder if it was ever raised as anything other than a thuggish scare/stalling tactic in the first place.)

Oddly, the same executives who speak with absolute authority about the horrifying injustice of paying residuals seem to turn into bewildered children, lost in a fogbound forest and helpless to see even two feet ahead, when they confront the other big issue: income from streaming video, new media, and the Internet. Writers, like everybody else with a brain and a computer, have figured out that this is where a large chunk of the future of movie and TV revenue resides, and they want a piece of it. To which the producers have essentially responded: What's this newfangled Interweb you're talking about? We don't know how it works! Are you sure there's a way we can make money from it? What a silly thing to even talk about! What next, flying cars?

Never mind that these same executives have, for years, vigorously pursued deals to put their content on the Internet, acquire websites, and sell advertising for both original and repurposed programming. (Why? To make money, in case anyone is unclear.) Suddenly, when the people who write that material ask for a share, they go all fuzzyheaded. One of AMPTP's demands has been a three-year period to study the economic viability of new media. You read that right: three years. If any studio honcho can keep a straight face while uttering the phrase ''three-year study,'' I'll fork over...at least two-thirds of a penny. What's the breakdown — one year to figure out the cash flow, one year to count the money, and one year to decide which lie to tell the writers?

The problem with this position is that writers deserve a share of revenue for material they help to create. Not a share only if the revenue is really, really a lot. A share, period. If it turns out that streaming video is a goldmine, then both sides will get a lot of money. If it turns out not to be, they'll get less. Corporations are fond of reminding their employees that they're all a ''family'' during tough times. But when families sit down to dinner, Dad doesn't get to say, ''I'm gonna eat until I decide I'm full, and then we'll see if there's anything left for the rest of you.'' The right of a writer to earn money from work that continues to generate revenue cannot be dependent on how comfy studio and network heads are with the fullness of their own coffers.

The rest of the article continues in the same vein. It's clear-headed, well thought out, and refreshingly free of wonkery. I suggest that if you're one of the people who are on the fence about the whole strike, or pursuing the "pox on both their houses" strategy of thinking, that this is one of those articles that -- if you have any modicum of an open mind left at all -- should tip the balance in the writer's favor for you.

And it took a print reporter to do it. Writing on a website, but still.

See, dead tree media? You are still relevant. Give us a scrunch! High-Five!

The full Harris article, "Why the Writers Are Right" is available here.