Comments on: Living Through the Strike

By: Joe

Joe — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 06:06:44 +0000

We don’t need any more of that reality crap.

By: Jonathan Gray

Jonathan Gray — Tue, 30 Oct 2007 03:28:26 +0000

Thanks for this Sam. That damage to daytime could be sizeable, I agree. I’m happy for your sake that at least you might get WWE theme weeks on TV

By: Sam Ford

Sam Ford — Sun, 28 Oct 2007 20:10:25 +0000

Like Jason, it didn’t occur to me at first what this might mean for Jon Stweart and Stephen Colbert’s shows…I don’t guess they fall directly into your question about what happens to primetime, since technically they are “late night,” but the writers strike is going to be most detrimental for these shows without seasons. Are the folks who help write the monologues for late-night TV show hosts in the same boat? Where this strike will have the most damage, unforutnately for me and millions of other daytime fans, is for soap operas, though. These shows only take about a month or six weeks ahead at their most optimistic. The writer’s strike back in 1988 lasted six months I believe, and creative for a lot of shows were damaged. This time around, with audineces smaller and questions about the cost of putting on soap operas coming into play across the networks, the alternatives aren’t good. Either bad creative with scab writers runs more fans off, or else the soaps get replaced. If 1995 and the O.J. Simpson trial was any indication, getting fans out of the rhythm of keeping up with their “story” daily could be greatly damaging to getting them back into the routine, since the repetitiveness of soaps is among their greatest strengths as a narrative device.

On the other hand, WWE is quite lucky. Dave Meltzer points out in The Wrestling Observer that the company has been lucky enough to not be governed by athletic commissions in many places because they are entertainment rather than sport, but they are designated as sports programming in official television terminology, which means the WGA strike won’t affect them because they are sports and not entertainment, or something like that. Back in 1988, WWE had “booking teams;” since then, they have moved to a full writing team, several of which may be WGA members. But apparently writing for the WWE would not be a violation for them, so WWE will be able to go on with their five hours of TV a week. The strike could actually be a boon for their programming, then, if the competition isn’t doing well, and if they could perhaps lure writers looking for work in the process…

By: Jonathan Gray

Jonathan Gray — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 18:23:14 +0000

Thanks Chad. As Jason wondered about rerun licensing, though, I also wonder about whether the networks have the rights to play these games. These days, sports licensing rights are multi-tiered, restricting broadcasters to a few specific games at specific times. That said, I did see that NBC was commissioning American Gladiators, so maybe that’d be their special weapon?

As for Colbert, I dunno if you’ve seen, but there are serious concerns about Comedy Central violating all sorts of FEC rules should Colbert continue his run. While a severing of the ties between him and Comedy Central during the strike might seem to free him up to play around on YouTube, etc., I’d imagine he’d be considered a scab if he does that. FunnyorDie.com, for instance, isn’t going to be able to get new clips from their stars and star writers during the strike, even though they’re not even ad-supported at this point in time. So Gravel will likely be the best thing we have in the way of comic relief for the election

By: Chad Harriss

Chad Harriss — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 23:30:36 +0000

I’d agree with Jason that game shows would likely benefit. In addition, we may see more prime-time sporting events, like football or extreme games. Events like these can be used fill entire prime-time evenings.

On the upside, a strike would give Colbert some time to focus on his presidential bid.

By: Jonathan Gray

Jonathan Gray — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 03:14:05 +0000

Ah yes, the limitations of reruns. I wasn’t thinking about that.

By: justtv.wordpress.com

justtv.wordpress.com — Tue, 23 Oct 2007 02:07:48 +0000

Oh my – I hadn’t considered that Daily Show/Colbert required writers! Oh the humanity…

My guess is that game shows would be particularly benefited by the strike – Deal/No Deal is still a hit, and if the competition lessened from scripted shows, a lot of others could find an audience. So if you’re a B-list comedian, call your agent.

I think the rerun idea is a no deal – most network license agreements stipulate only one or two reruns in a 1-year window. My guess is that ABC no longer has the rights to rerun anything but season 3 of Lost (if that). And to get those rights, they’d have to negotiate with both Touchstone (which they own) and Bad Robot, which they don’t & is owned by J.J. Abrams. Here’s where the whole issue becomes so fuzzy – on TV, writers are also producers, and often own one of the production companies credited with a show. So Abrams goes on strike as a WGA member, but does that make his company effectively on strike? Or is Bad Robot part of management by default? Where’s the line when writers are also bosses?

My guess is that networks are going to avoid a strike, or only let it be short, as the business model is too fragile to risk turning the masses onto alternatives. But rich people protecting a dying business model are hard to predict, so who knows?