In a memo acquired by the Hollywood Reporter, Bob McPhail, assistant chief counsel for ABC Signature, a Disney subsidiary, reminded showrunners for Disney exhibits that they “aren’t excused from performing your duties as a showrunner and/or producer in your sequence because of the WGA strike.”
Showrunners are multi-hyphenate writer-producers, which implies they each write and produce. However to ask a showrunner to return to work and never make any changes to the script, dialogue, plot, or story appears like a large catch-22. Any writing completed for a WGA-struck firm is scab work, and Disney placing stress on workers to indicate their allegiance to the company over the union is… not a terrific look, to say the least. Including to that, many (if not all) showrunners are within the WGA themselves.
The letter is dated Could 3—two days after the strike started. In it, McPhail says {that a} showrunner’s agreements with a studio—whether or not that’s Disney, ABC, or one other manufacturing—requires that showrunners “carry out your showrunner and/or producing duties even when the WGA makes an attempt to tremendous you for performing such companies through the strike.”
The letter additionally features a FAQ that’s written as if writers aren’t already unionized, and incorporates main questions like “Do writers should strike when the WGA calls a strike?” “I’ve heard that the WGA can self-discipline or tremendous members who proceed working throughout a strike. Is that this true?” and “Could I get replaced throughout a strike?”
The FAQ connected to the letter additionally outlines that showrunners can be requested to carry out “a. by way of h. companies”—these are changes that happen through the manufacturing course of, resembling slicing for time, making line changes, and customarily permitting producers to create a cohesive narrative throughout post-production. Whereas technically talking these are duties that the WGA states non-writers can carry out on WGA-covered initiatives, the strike guidelines issued by the WGA clearly prohibit hyphenate union members from doing any of those “a. by way of h. companies” through the strike: “The Guidelines prohibit hyphenates (members who’re employed in twin capacities) from performing any writing companies, together with the ‘(a) by way of (h)’ capabilities.”
It is genuinely unimaginable to suggest that writer-producers ought to threat WGA fines and retaliatory motion from the union in the event that they really feel like conserving their jobs—this is the way you set hearth to any goodwill there may’ve been on the beginning of this motion. You possibly can read the total letter and FAQ at the Hollywood Reporter.
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