The Shape of Things to Come: WGA, AMPTP, and the DGA

The trades would have us believe that the AMPTP will start negotiations with the DGA as soon as next week, if the AMPTP satisfies "the DGA's condition that it can establish 'an apropriate basis for negotiations'."

Why sit down with the DGA and not the WGA? Only the AMPTP knows the answer to that question, but for months, Nicholas Counter has said very publicly that he preferred to negotiate with the DGA. The AMPTP press releases blamed that on the writers, but the PR spin notwithstanding, the truth was pretty obvious. The AMPTP stonewalled our leadership because they wanted to wait for the DGA.

If the DGA does start negotations with the congloms next week, does that mean the WGA negotiations committee will become irrelevant, standing on the sidelines, reduced to being helpless observers? Certainly that's what the AMPTP would like us to think. But we know that isn't the truth. We know that our leadership is working behind the scenes, putting pressure on the congloms politically and economically. We know that our picketing and fan support has increased the public's awareness of our issues. We know too that an outreach effort to the individual companies was started when the AMPTP walked away from the table. The deal with World Wide Pants was the tangible result of that effort.

There will be even more opportunities to break through and settle the strike. The WGA leadership will continue to talk with companies like World Wide Pants that see the advantage to concluding an agreement with us now, rather than waiting for the inevitable conclusion of the strike.

So what about our sister guild, the DGA? If they begin negotiations with the AMPTP, let's hope their issues are the same as ours. Of course there will be differences as each guild's leadership pursues what's best for their members. But let's hope that they will succeed in pushing open the door to the internet and stopping, once and for all, the ridiculous proposals from the congloms that have come our way.

From the beginning of the strike, the WGA leadership knew that our contract negotiation was the first of many battles with the AMPTP for the future of all of Hollywood's unions. If the DGA begins their talks with the congloms, then we'll have another ally in that struggle.

Since the AMPTP has been so eager to sit down with the DGA, let's hope they conclude their discussions quickly so they'll come back to us.

The strike isn't over until we get a fair and equitable contract.