Strike Watch 2007!

Producers Blast WGA's Use of "Fear and Intimidation"
In the wake of reports that some soaps writers have returned to work via a loophole called "financial core" status, the WGA West has formed a Strike Rules Compliance Committee whose mission, says chair Dan Wilcox, "is to ensure that the strike rules are strictly enforced." And the first rule of strike club? "There is no more fundamental working rule than the prohibition against a WGA member performing struck work" — as some Young and the Restless scribes are said to be doing.

The SRCC tells WGA members, "You must inform the Guild of the name of any writer you have reason to believe is engaged in strike-breaking activity or other scab writing…. If you have suspicions about a particular writer or project, the best way to report them will be to call our hotline. Our purpose is not to punish people; it is to head off scab work before it can undermine the strike."

The existence of and enforcement of rules by the SRCC drew immediate fire from the Association of Motion Picture and Television Producers, whose president on Tuesday issued a statement asserting, "The WGA is using fear and intimidation to control its membership. Asking members to inform on each other and creating a blacklist of those who question the tactics of the WGA leadership is as unacceptable today as it was when the WGA opposed these tactics in the 1950s."


CBS News Writers May Join Walkout Come Monday

The CBS News staffers represented by the Writers Guild of America East are expected to join the picket line on Monday. The union members, who include news and promo writers, graphic artists and a few producers at the network, have been working without a contract for more then two years. But now that their union counterparts on the entertainment side have walked off the job in their dispute with the studios over payment for digital distribution, the CBS News employees are feeling emboldened to walk. "The betting is it will happen on Monday," says one CBS News insider. "They have the solidarity and the power of the West Coast."

The WGA East members are expected to favor a strike when they vote on Thursday. The network's public stance has been that its prepared for a strike and that it will "continue to produce quality news programs for our viewers." The WGAE has rejected the networks' proposal, which featured a two-tiered system that would pay writers for national programs a higher rate than those who write for local shows. CBS is also refusing to make any pay increase retroactive to the expiration date of the last contract.

Embattled Ellen Cancels NYC Show Plans

I've just been given the exclusive news that Ellen DeGeneres will not be bringing her syndicated talk show to NYC next week as planned. (The New York Post story today is wrong.) Ellen is taping her TBS special tomorrow night in Las Vegas and was supposed to catch a plane immediately afterwards for NYC.

The Ellen Degeneres Show was planning to tape in NYC next Monday and Tuesday, November 19th and 20th. Ellen is both a member a the WGA and AFTRA. Which is why the Writers Guild Of America East issued the statement it did last Friday headlined "Ellen Is Not Welcome In NY." The guild had pledged to "certainly let Ellen know our dissatisfaction in person if she decides to proceed with the shows she has scheduled [and] make our voices heard the preceding week if she tries to pre-tape comedy segments on location." Since then Ellen has been under fire by writers and others. The "s" word, for scab, has even been used during this controversy.

There has been a running dispute between the WGA East and AFTRA with Ellen smack in the middle because she went back on the air after honoring only one day of the writers strike. On her first day back, Ellen said she supports her writers but returned to work because of a) her crew and b) her company, which ordered her to, and c)a no-strike clause in her AFTRA contract.

But AFTRA was quick to defend Ellen, saying she had done nothing to violate the WGA agreement and noting that DeGeneres, like other first-run syndications that deliver original programming (Dr. Phil, Regis and Kelly, and Oprah), has a contractual obligation as host and producer. Also a portion of the Writers Guild's "Minimum Basic Agreement" (MBA) supposedly excuses Ellen's situation.

But the writers guild scolded Ellen for not making an "act of individual conscience".

I should note here that AFTRA is often accused of having undercut Guild contracts for years and poaching jobs that are traditional union jurisdiction. But AFTRA pulled out a letter to Ellen dated November 8th (and written before today's WGAE statement) expressing "appreciation" to Ellen "for your individual act of solidarity shown to the striking writers in their efforts to negotiate a fair contract with the industry producers."

1. WGAE Replies To AFTRA About Ellen Mess
2. AFTRA Defends Ellen; Rep Says She "Has Done Nothing" To Violate WGA
3. WGAE States Ellen "Not Welcome In NY"