According to a recent Deadline report, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) is in the strike for the long haul—with a plan to let the Writers Guild of America (WGA) “bleed out” before resuming negotiations. “The endgame is to allow things to drag on until union members start losing their apartments and losing their houses,” one source told the trade.
The WGA is entering its 72nd day on the picket lines, striking against the AMPTP in hopes of negotiating a new contract with Hollywood studios. However, sources told Deadline that the AMPTP, led by Carol Lombardini, is not interested in negotiating with the scribes anytime soon. “I think we’re in for a long strike,” said one industry veteran with insight into the studios’ perspective.
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Since the writers went on strike May 2, studios and streamers such as Warner Bros. Discovery, Apple, Netflix, Amazon, Disney, and Paramount have received positive feedback from Wall Street in their quest to, as one studio exec told Deadline, “break the WGA.” According to the report, the studios and streamers have been prepared for the long haul since the very beginning. “It’s been agreed to for months, even before the WGA went out,” one executive said. “Nobody wanted a strike, but everybody knew this was make or break.”
The Deadline report came approximately 30 hours before the actors union, SAG-AFTRA, is set to announce whether it will join the WGA in a strike against the AMPTP or reach a deal. Regardless of whether SAG-AFTRA strikes a deal with the AMPTP, the studios have no intention of coming back to the table with the WGA until the fall, a top-tier producer told Deadline: “Not Halloween precisely, but late October, for sure, is the intention.”
With the actors out also, it puts more pressure on the studios to act prudently. But with super rich studio heads who can afford to hold out for the long haul, is shame enough to get them to negotiate?