Hollywood responded by shedding lots and lots of writer deals yesterday. Business goes on. Yawn.
By the way, another plug for Jeffery Stepakoff's Billion Dollar Kiss here. If you weren't there for the writer gold rush in the 1990's, the book lays bare the leadup to this strike. These brilliant businesspeople who are holding up a deal that even Wall Street says is fair? They're same guys who spent money like a chocoholic at the Hershey factory all through the 90's. Bad management that they now want to fix on the backs of labor. Sound familiar?
If the DGA deal is crap, or if there is no deal -- this one's going on for a while.
One interesting thing that will merit attention -- one of the side deals the WGA made in the last couple of days wasn't with a traditional "producer" at all.
LOS ANGELES – The Writers Guild of America (WGA) and MRC, the independent film, television, and digital studio, have reached a comprehensive interim agreement that forges a new alliance between writers, producers, and financiers in the production of feature films, television shows, and digital programs.
"This is an exciting agreement that will open up opportunities for writers, especially in New Media," said Patric M. Verrone, president of the Writers Guild of America, West, and Michael Winship, president of the Writers Guild of America, East. "We know that Guild members will be eager to be a part of the MRC creative team."
"MRC operates from two basic concepts and this agreement is a natural extension of that ethos: we treat talent as our partners and we maximize distribution across all digital, film and television platforms," said MRC co-CEO’s Asif Satchu and Modi Wiczyk. "As with all of our partnerships, we could not have accomplished this agreement without creative talent. In this case, we especially want to thank our colleague Seth MacFarlane for helping pave the way with the WGA and also to the leaders of the Guild who worked with the utmost professionalism."
The Media Rights Capital deal grew out of a deal with Seth McFarlane for Family Guy webisodes. And I believe they're also the group that last year announced some obscene deal for Sacha Baron Cohen's next film. This is the real potential game changer, because they allow creators to retain all rights. Hmm....While everyone tries to figure out the endgame, something else is happening here.
Out of the ashes comes the future.
Me, I'm still on my couch reading scripts.
5 comments:
One book every writer should read is Naomi Klien's "The Shock Doctrine". It's a relatively lucid explanation of what's behind the corporate schizophrenia that's been going around of late. Nobody should be surprised it's affecting our businesss as well
The deal makes logical sense. It's only like an outlet-operator investing in supply. It's not hard to imagine the online market quickly growing to the point where the networks have to bid for what they once used to make.
Thank you so much for the recommendation on Billion Dollar Kiss.
Since I got to L.A. in 2001 people have been saying to me, "The TV business is changing." And while everyone could point to how much more frequently shows were getting cancelled after three or four episodes, or how network notes had become ubiquitous, no one could really explain what was causing it beyond vaguely pointing to consolidation or the end of Fin-Syn.
Not only was this book a great read, it clearly lays out both the how of television's changes, but also the why.
I'm recommending it right and left now.
what are you reading, Dennis?
Book are for fools. Real men and women watch the Sarah Connor Chronicles.
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