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After two final days back at the negotiating table this week, the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and TV Producers late last night reached a deal on a new three-year contract. No details of the agreement have been revealed as both parties want to reach out to respective members later today before going public, I’m told. The current contract expires May 1, which means the longer-than-expected talks leave the union having to pull together a ratification vote lickety-split. Already agreeing on everything but the chestnut issues of options and exclusivity , the two sides took an 18-day break before returning to talks at AMPTP headquarters in Sherman Oaks on Monday. As I reported on March 6 , even with the scribes taking a stronger line than during the last negotiations and the studios/networks more divided than last time, the sides were “very close” to a deal even before they took their first temporary recess from February 15-March 4. That break came after an … [Read more...] about WGA & AMPTP Reach Tentative New 3-Year Deal

As talks are about to resume Monday on the final elements that many hope will lead to a new deal for the Writers Guild Of America, we wanted to lend some perspective and give voice to the TV and feature writers whose fortunes will be tied directly to the deal their union makes. This is the second in a quick succession of five questions we asked a panel of 10 writers. Here are their responses, and hopefully other writers will be moved to comment about the issues that worry them most as their work is monetized in this fast-changing digital age. Related: WGA: Why Gains, Lessons From 2008′s Strike Will Keep Hollywood From Another War DEADLINE: As a working writer, what is the biggest hardship right now facing you (i.e., one-step deals for feature writers, exclusivity clauses for TV writers), the one that gives you the greatest amount of worry for you and your WGA brethren? WRITER #1: I think the biggest setback from the strike was one-step deals. One-step deals were a … [Read more...] about Writers Rail As Talks Resume – Second Question In A Deadline Survey

As talks are about to resume Monday on the final elements that many hope will lead to a new deal for the Writers Guild Of America, we wanted to lend some perspective and give voice to the TV and feature writers whose fortunes will be tied directly to the deal their union makes. This is the third in a quick succession of five questions we asked a panel of 10 writers. Here are their responses, and hopefully other writers will be moved to comment about the issues that worry them most as their work is monetized in this fast-changing digital age. Related: WGA: Why Gains, Lessons From 2008′s Strike Will Keep Hollywood From Another War DEADLINE: How are you feeling about the deal that the WGA is considering, and what concerns do you have that aren’t addressed in it? WRITER #1: I trust that small gains will be made and a strike will be averted and at this stage of the business that’s all that can really be expected. That is actually a success in 2014. Related: … [Read more...] about Writers Rail As Talks Resume – Third Question In A Deadline Survey

As expected, the national board of SAG-AFTRA voted overwhelmingly tonight to approve the terms of a new three-year film and TV contract . It now will go to the union’s 165,000 members for final ratification. The new contract had been unanimously recommended to the board by the union’s negotiating committee, which included SAG-AFTRA President Ken Howard and National Executive Director David White . The board tonight voted 90% to 10% to approve the new contract, which achieved the major goal of the union going into the talks: the unification of its two separate television contracts. Related: Guild Official: Merging SAG And AFTRA TV Deals Key Goal Of Talks When SAG and AFTRA merged in 2012, the new union was stuck with two separate pension and health plans, and two separate TV contracts. The unification of the TV contracts, which guild leaders called “historic,” is considered a major milestone in the still-evolving merger of the two unions. Related: WGA … [Read more...] about (Non) Shocker! SAG-AFTRA Board Approves New Contract

Related: DGA, Producers Reach Tentative Deal On New Contract As expected, the Directors Guild of America Board today unanimously rubber-stamped the new three-year deal its negotiating committee finalized with the Alliance of Motion Picture and TV Producers on Friday. With the board’s approval, the agreement now goes to the DGA ’s 15,000 members for ratification to succeed the current Basic Agreement and the Freelance Live and Tape TV Agreement, which expire on June 30, 2014. No word yet on when that voting deadline will be but the DGA expect to announce a date just before the voting packages go out in the next week or so. The board meeting started around 9 AM today at the DGA HQ on Sunset and went into the early afternoon. The deal, which took just two and a half weeks to reach, sees wage increases of 2.5% the first year and 3% for the second and third years of the agreement. It also sees a 0.5% raise up to 16% overall to the Pension Plan, though the DGA can divert … [Read more...] about DGA Board Approves New Contract With Producers; 2.5% Wage Increase For 1st Year, 0.5% Pension Increase, Some SVOD & AVOD Increases

There was a moment last November when Channel 4 ’s senior executives breathed a sigh of relief. Sat at the top table of Channel 4’s 40th birthday party, Chief Executive Alex Mahon was flanked by her friend Elisabeth Murdoch and doyens of UK broadcasting, including BBC Director-General Tim Davie and Carolyn McCall, ITV’s Chief Executive. They were raising a glass to a British success story in a rare public display of unity. On the same table was Thérèse Coffey, a senior government minister who had survived three prime ministers in the space of little more than three months. Her presence at the V&A Museum event bemused others, who believed the government only had hostile intentions for Channel 4 after sanctioning a sale of the broadcaster against its wishes. Things soon got weirder. Coffey turned to Mahon and asked if she could raise a glass to Channel 4. She then proceeded to surprise the room full of TV luminaries by serenading her hosts with a rendition of happy … [Read more...] about Channel 4: Inside The Doomed Sale Of A Crown Jewel Of British Television

Taking a cue from David Letterman , SAG-AFTRA has released a “Top Ten” list of reasons why its members should vote “yes” on the union’s just-negotiated film and TV contract . We’ve laid out the list here, with some heavy-handed editing for, ahem, excessive length, but all the words are theirs, not ours. What do you think about their list? Do you have your own list of reasons (yes or no) to back the contract? 1. A Competitive Wage Package: … By achieving wage gains of 2.5 …to 3 percent applied to all programs …your committee maximized the money that members have the opportunity to earn. And by electing to increase the Pension, Health and Retirement contribution rates by .5 percent in the first year…, we not only improved the funding of the benefits plans—a crucial step toward … merger—but also extracted the maximum dollar value from the Producers. … network primetime rerun ceilings will increase by 2% each year…. a deal valued at $30 million more than… 2011…an … [Read more...] about SAG-AFTRA Posts 10 Reasons To Vote Yes On New Contract; Do Members Agree?

EXCLUSIVE: Which guild will go first at the bargaining table – the DGA , the WGA or SAG-AFTRA – remains undetermined for the upcoming cycle of film and TV contract talks with the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers. If history is any judge, who goes first could foreshadow whether there will be a strike – or more than one strike – this year. In the end, it will be up to each guild, working in consultation with the AMPTP , to decide when, and in what order, they start bargaining. The DGA has gone first in each of the past three three-year bargaining cycles, even though its contracts expire at the same time as SAG-AFTRA’s – on June 30 – and two months after the WGA’s contract on May 1. The DGA often begins its negotiations many months in advance of the expiration of its contracts. “When it comes to making the decision about when to start negotiations,” the DGA said recently, “we are guided by one simple principle: We will only begin bargaining … [Read more...] about Going First At Bargaining Table Means A Lot, But No Word Yet If It Will Be DGA, WGA or SAG-AFTRA

With one day to go before its current 3-year contract expires, the WGA said today that its members ratified the new agreement by a huge margin — the ones who actually voted, that is. “The WGA membership overwhelmingly voted in favor of ratifying the contract by 98.5 percent,” the union said in a statement. Ballots were to be cast online, by mail or at membership meetings in New York and Los Angeles on April 29. Not that a lot of the union’s members turned out to actually vote on the deal that was struck on April 2 with the Alliance of Motion Picture and TV Producers . Of the 8,218 eligible WGA voters, only 1,193 valid votes were actually cast. That’s just 14%. Of those actually voting, there were 1,175 “Yes” votes and 18 “No” votes, according to the union. Last time round in 2011 , 1,952 votes were cast with 90.7% voting in favor of the agreement. Having said that, at least the WGA revealed how many members voted. When DGA members ratified their new deal earlier this year , … [Read more...] about WGA Members Approve New Contract; Less Than 15% Of Eligible Voters Cast Ballots

There’ll be fireworks but no fire, and there will be a deal in the end. That’s the word I’m hearing from both sides out of the WGA ’s contract negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and TV Producers after two days of talks . No one is commenting publicly, but I’ve learned that besides presentations from both sides during the opening days, there’s palpable unease in the room at AMPTP HQ thanks to the multimillion-dollar rollback proposal producers sent the WGA more than a week before negotiations began. “There’s a feeling of, Why did you have to insult us?’” a WGA insider told me over the producers’ request for $60 million in rollbacks from the health and pension plans, residuals and targeted screenplay minimums. “Once again it makes us the least favored child of the guilds.” Some on the other side of the table don’t disagree with that assessment. “Those were ridiculous proposals meant to appease the people at the top, not anyone in the room,” a well-placed … [Read more...] about WGA Contract Talks Brittle In Opening Days Over “Ridiculous” AMPTP Proposals