Spotlight Feature: The Writers' Strike & Its Impact

By Frank Macek

Now that the Writers' Strike is heading into its 2nd month, the impact of failed negotiations between both sides is leading down a path that will be nearly impossible to return from.

The 2007 Writers Guild of America strike is a strike by the Writers Guild of America, East (WGAE) and the Writers Guild of America, West (WGAW) that started on November 5, 2007. The WGAE and WGAW are two labor unions that represent film, television and radio writers working in the United States.

The strike is against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), a trade organization that represents the interests of American film and television producers. Over 12,000 writers are affected by the strike.

The last such strike in 1988 lasted 22 weeks, and cost the American entertainment industry an estimated 500 million dollars.

Some late night shows are heading back into production without writers. Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien both announced recently they would resume producing new shows in early 2008. Others are sure to follow suit to safeguard the hundreds of other production employees who work on each of these shows.

Our feeling is three main things are going to happen if the strike continues into the first of the year.

First: You will see the end of the Fall TV Season. Virtually all the pilots for scripted programming will be shelved from production. This will also mean that come September, the typical fall premiere week will be a thing of the past. Once the cycle is broken, it will be very hard for the networks to go back to the traditional way of presenting their broadcast schedules. Instead, we may see the beginning of a 12 month television season where new shows will debut all year. Experts compare this to how the cable networks have begun to operate, where the calendar month is no longer important.

Second: Scripted dramas will give way to another round of reality shows. Because reality shows are easy and cheaper to produce, these will take over as the dominant choice of primetime programming. The majority of the network primetime schedules will be unscripted shows like "Deal or No Deal," "The Biggest Loser," or "American Gladiators." Shows including the daytime soap operas may be cancelled forever. And once they are gone, they are gone. The networks will find the perfect opportunity to dump the high production costs of soaps which have seen declining numbers for years anyway.

Third: Networks will look overseas and to Canada for their programming needs. This allows them to not only get around having to use union writers, but opens up new opportunities for network executives to buy successful shows directly from foreign distributors, effectively outsourcing a majority of the television programs we will begin to see, as early as 2008.

The lack of serious progress between the writers' unions and studio producers are getting to a critical point. It's very likely that another month or two of failed talks will lead to a massive shift in television programming strategies and away from the traditional premiere and finale models that has been in place for many decades.

Television may never be the same again.

VIDEO FEATURE:
To watch Vic Gideon's report about our local writers' strike protests: CLICK HERE

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