How “AMPTP F***ed Up” Actors Join Fight – The Hollywood Reporter

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This is part of a series of candid accounts of the strike from Hollywood writers at different levels in their careers.

I think AMPTP forgot the first lesson discerning parents quickly learn: do no Short change nanny.

Carole Lombardini did just that, and now SAG-AFTRA will strike.

First, let’s step back: Pavement was as hard as ever. The heat is unbearable. sheet numbers. The loneliest place on earth, the picket line next to the cosmopolitan main gate – where the sidewalk literally ends. Paramount was all airpods and sunburn. (Some decent restaurants handed out lemonade. God bless them.) Even Disney’s family-friendly line felt like a chain gang.

Not going to lie, we knew it was going to be tough. But by the seventy-second day our spirits were cracking. The distant strike horizon loomed long and large. But then take advantage of AMPTP’s performance. Great moment.

Quite possibly the dumbest executive in business Delivery time The most brutal article, and in the end they let the mask slip and said the unsayable: let the writers starve. The anonymous source admitted, “The deal was done months ago.” Studios want to break WGA, drag this out so writers “lose their homes”.

A “cruel but necessary evil” to protect C-suite’s inflated and unjustified compensation. These are real quotes. Even Marie Antoinette flinched.

Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb. The writer lit up Twitter with rumors of Zoom the morning after as the studio’s screaming heads were pointing fingers at each other. Whoever let this stupid mess happen will soon be living thousands of miles from Los Angeles, possibly printing fliers offering 2-for-1 Blizzard’s Bangor, Maine Dairy Queen. The fun new salon game on picket lines this week guess who was dumb enough to say the quiet part out loud.

But thank you whoever you are. Because those quotes were a source of strength for us. They mentioned each writer Why We do this. Why We Can’t Give Up – Now, you’d better believe that not a single writer doubts that this is perhaps the most important stroke in the history of our craft and industry. Nothing unites like the Big Bad. Nothing makes heroes like an unrelenting villain.

Then, in our darkest hour, amid the first signs of despondency, as the defenders of Helms Deep slumped in anticipation of AMPTP’s promise of eradication, a century sounded in the wilderness. And over the Hollywood Hills came the fearsome Knights of Rohan!

Not Gandalf per se, but Sir Ian McKellen himself! and Meryl Streep. and Quinta Bronson. And Salma Hayek fucking.

The actors have come to lend a hand to their poor, sweaty writer friends. (They know who writes jokes that make it look good.) A struggling AMPTP tried to light the SAG in another stretch and it backfired in their faces. Clearly, Carol has no idea what it’s like to work on set. Because if she did, she’d never know that you were Forcing an actor to say a sentence they don’t believe in. And you certainly don’t stress them out into signing a deal that sells their digital soul to the hubby of generative AI.

Now that’s real. And now you, AMPTP, through your ill will and intransigence, have set this industry on fire. All you have to do is make a fair deal. All you had to do was codify the practices that made this industry such a success. But instead, I wanted to break us. Out of pure greed, she imagined feeding us bland, boring chatbots. (Although that’s a pipe dream fueled by big tech monopolists who destroy every industry they enter, stealing other people’s livelihoods for themselves so they can build Apocalypse bunkers to hide in once they’ve finally completely destroyed the planet. The rest of us. Besides, I’m not going to tip your hat with Big AI just yet – Looks like the Federal Trade Commission might come for them.)

Not only that: we caught you in the act. Because every WGA writer would print that Delivery time Essay and mail it to the National Board of Review for Work. You see, not compromising in good faith and threatening employees with union activity is actually a crime. So while righteous anger tempts me to “weep havoc and let the dogs of war slip away” – and though part of me wants to go All Michael Keaton/Batman at this moment – There is a wiser course of action here. Because we writers want to get back into making movies, doing our jobs, and creating one of America’s most valuable exports internationally—as long as we get a fair deal that protects our future and the future of the industry. Since the studios can’t seem to fathom the extent of this for us, I have another solution:

Dear President Biden,

It’s time for the federal government to step in. AMPTP has revealed that it has no intention of compromising in good faith and would rather let Hollywood burn than engage in a rational and mutually beneficial deal. If they don’t listen, maybe it’s time for the FTC to dismantle the vertically integrated media conglomerates that pretend to be studios: That’s what we were really discussing on picket lines. And while we’re talking, maybe they should break up the big tech companies, too? Google, Amazon, and Meta are de facto monopolies that manipulate markets and crush competition. Also, the budding AI lobby has corrupted the Senate Copyright Subcommittee, as anyone knows Who watched Tom Tellis and Chris Koons throw artists under the bus yesterday. Because, while Silicon Valley might cut tons of PAC tests for everyone this election cycle, you know what that is. no A winning political strategy? Just letting Big Tech give everyone’s jobs to robots. This is how countries fall apart, and we love that.

sincerely,

Hollywood workers

Note: If you have time, you can also investigate Why the studios dropped all of their various executives?