As Writers’ Standoff With Studios Drags on, Political Power Brokers Stay on Sidelines
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As soon as the Writers Guild announced its strike on May 2 over a failure to agree on a new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass and California Gov. Gavin Newsom issued statements to make it clear the work stoppage was top of mind. “Los Angeles relies on a strong entertainment industry that is the envy of the world while putting Angelenos to work in good, middle-class jobs,” Bass said. “I encourage all sides to come together around an agreement that protects our signature industry and the families it supports.”
For his part, Newsom noted that “when called in by both sides we’ll intervene, to the extent both sides are willing and interested in that,” adding that the strike “has profound consequences direct and indirect.” (A week later, President Biden also weighed in, noting that he hoped “the writers are given a fair deal they deserve as soon as possible.”)
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Nearly two months into the conflict — as SAG-AFTRA nears its June 30 deadline to negotiate a new labor agreement with the AMPTP under the threat of the union’s own strike authorization — the two politicians, who by virtue of their offices could heavily lean on the factions to force a deal, have yet to either publicly re-engage or, for that matter, substantively push for a resolution in private. Bass didn’t return a request for comment. Newsom’s office says it has “nothing more to add at this time.” Meanwhile, some of the most labor-aligned members of the city councils in both Los Angeles and New York have since introduced formal resolutions calling on the AMPTP to restart talks in good faith.
There is recent precedent for such intervention: In the early weeks of the 2007-08 strike, both California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa reportedly applied pressure. Many entertainment insiders, though, assume that powerful industry figures will eventually swoop in to break the logjam, in the long tradition that runs from Lew Wasserman to Bob Daly and Peter Chernin.
Top Hollywood attorney Ken Ziffren, who helped end the 2007-08 strike, would likely find it more difficult to navigate this time around, as his recently closed DGA deal — he currently serves as outside counsel for the directors’ organization — has been decried by a swath of the WGA’s rank-and-file. The rumor mill for proxies this time around centers on Disney CEO Bob Iger stepping forward for the studios, while there’s no clear consensus on who might play an equivalent role for the writers. (It’s unclear if WGA or the AMPTP negotiators would welcome an intermediary at this time.)
Still, given the complexity and acrimony of this strike, outside levers may need pulling. In a sign of the times, permitting nonprofit group FilmLA — which tracks feature, TV and commercial shoots in Los Angeles County — plans to reduce its hours of operation “due to an overall decline in permit volume and on-location filming” as productions have ground to a halt.
Elected officials know that timing is key to efficacy. Intervening too early can lead to accusations of meddling, while waiting too long may mean that deepening rancor and spillover effects will make the negotiations even tougher to resolve. “It’s not a science,” observes Wendy Greuel, who worked as a government affairs executive at DreamWorks before serving on the L.A. City Council and as L.A.’s city controller. (She’s now a member of the California Film Commission.) “During the 2007 strike, while I was on the Council, you saw that the restaurants were hurting, the hairdressers and the dry cleaners. There are [indirect] consequences that add up. Those stories filter out and can push people to the table.”
Those seasoned in the complexities of labor diplomacy say deals are only sealed through trust, and that’s where respected proxies can rebuild bridges. “The sides need to be able to be honest with the neutral third party about what their bottom line is,” explains organizational strategist Ana Guerrero, who spent eight years as L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti’s chief of staff. “Then that third party can be a translator and a synthesizer of each side’s interests and paint a picture about consensus.”
Politicians’ intercession into stalled negotiations is often just as much about a change of scenery as a new castmember. Guerrero notes that City Hall itself has had a salutary effect in resetting standoffs between, for example, the Port of Los Angeles dockworkers’ union and the shipping industry’s trade group, the Pacific-Maritime Association.
Katherine Oliver, who served as New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg’s commissioner of the Office of Media and Entertainment, recalls that during the 2007 Broadway stagehand strike, he offered all parties Gracie Mansion as a meeting place. “He didn’t directly involve himself in the negotiations, but he encouraged all sides to talk and sort things out,” she explains. “He said, ‘Broadway depends on you working this out quickly,’ meaning the economy of that area, the other businesses, too.”
On a national level, the Federal Mediation & Conciliation Service will send out facilitators to solve private-sector labor disputes — if both sides request the help of the government. (In 2007, the WGA and AMPTP agreed to call in a FMCS mediator before the strike began.) “Grievance mediation is a voluntary step after the parties have exhausted internal procedures and before arbitration,” the agency explains in its literature. In Newsom’s statement on the first day of the strike, he said he was “very hopeful that we can extend this not beyond the 100 days of the last strike,” and indeed “no more than a few weeks.” More than a few weeks have since passed.
Schwarzenegger, now back to acting, recently topped the Nielsen streaming charts in Netflix’s FUBAR, which has already been picked up for a second season. It’s unclear whether it will be delayed by the strike. The star and former governor didn’t respond to The Hollywood Reporter‘s request to discuss the current crisis.
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