Television and movie writers around the world, including Australia, are keeping a close eye on the Hollywood writers seeking pay increases from Netflix, Walt Disney, Paramount and other studios before a May 1 deadline.

According to the Writers Guild of America (WGA), 97.85 per cent of members voted in favour of giving union negotiators the power to call a strike, moving a step closer to a production shutdown that would hamper studios and disrupt what viewers see on television.

“If the Writers Guild moves in this direction, it will be very visible, very noisy and very disruptive. Anything topical around talk shows, magazine and infotainment gets curtailed very quickly,” Queensland University of Technology creative industries lecturer Dr Ruari Elkington said.

AI scripts?

Dr Elkington suggests keeping a close eye on how the “emergent use of AI [for example, ChatGPT, AI chatbot software intelligence] will be handled by both sides”.

“The studios can, of course, see massive cost efficiencies in the potential of AI to develop and potentially refine scripts,” he said.

“While this tech is not necessarily new, AI has been informing Hollywood decision making around projects for some time – what is new is the existential threat that writers now feel around how AI might derail what is already a very precarious career.

“The Writers Guild (WGA) negotiations around how AI is used – and just as importantly credited and seen to be used – will really shape the context of how AI intersects with the commercial use and distribution of creative work in the near future.”

The New Daily has approached the Australian Writers Guild (AWG) for comment as many of its members work both in Australia and the US.

What it means for Australia

The last Writers Guild strike was 15 years ago, from November 2007 to February 2008, with American network TV effectively shutting down production for two months.

The strike lasted 100 days.

The TV networks resorted to broadcasting re-runs and more reality shows, while the cost to the Californian economy alone was estimated at $US2.1 billion ($3.1 billion).

“The longer a strike goes on, the more studios, streamers and networks will draw programming from non-WGA sources: Reality shows and foreign TV … during the [last] strike, there was a boom in reality shows that lasted long after the writers returned to work,” wrote USA Today.

At the time, CBS’s The Amazing Race, Big Brother and The Price is Right all received a boost in episode numbers, while in Australia the Ten Network’s Good News Week filled in a gaping scheduling hole.

In fact, it was meant to be a one-off special in 2007, but a new run lasted until 2011, with a final special a year later.

So if a deal can’t be reached in two weeks’ time, what are the implications for the local industry?

“There will be many outside the US who will adopt a ‘let’s not let a crisis go to waste’ stance and will be seeking the opportunity as this unfolds,” Dr Elkington said.

It means productions in the works could be fast-tracked, and then exported to the US and stocked as back-up lists.

“As with previous WGA strikes, we’d expect there will be an increased demand for content from outside the US, particularly from English-speaking countries like the UK and Australia,” one German film company whose films and shows feature on the BBC and Stan told The Hollywood Reporter.

Tweet from @MorePerfectUS

‘Hollywood is broken’

Writers say they have suffered during the streaming TV boom, in part due to shorter seasons and smaller residuals, and they are seeking pay increases from Netflix Inc, Walt Disney Co and other studios.

One of the Abbott Elementary writers says the show, which is on the American ABC network, will turn up a day later on Hulu, then HBO Max and then Disney+.

“So the amount for a re-air on the network is $US13,500 and the amount you’re paid for that episode being on new media – streaming – is $US700,” they said.

Many say not much has changed for writers since the 2007 strike.

“Hollywood is broken,” said US-based non-profit media organisation, More Perfect Union, which made an eight-minute explainer on the issues facing TV writers paid by the studios.

“Writers are crucial,” Dr Elkington said.

“It all starts with the script … and if the script is weak or under-developed, the movie or series will not be able to deliver.

“It’s very, very hard for a piece of screen content that relies on a script to rise above the inherent quality of that script – ‘you can polish the crap, but it will still be crap’, as is often said.”

So if a strike is called, audiences will first see the impact on late-night TV talk shows, which use teams of writers to pen topical jokes.

Next is daytime soaps, while many comedies and dramas are in a safer programming space as they’re filmed months in advance, giving them a longer lead time before fresh episodes run out.

For example, Yellowstone (Paramount) season five has been written, with the second half set to be filmed later this year, so you won’t miss a thing when it lands in Australia.

Netflix confirmed in March that Penn Badgley’s serial killer series You has been commissioned for a fifth season, with reports the writers are “bringing Joe home”, suggesting the episodes have already been written.

What about the studios?

How would studios react to another disruption after the COVID-19 pandemic shut down production worldwide for months?

“Feature films are in many ways the last in the chain here due to long script development times and the substantial investments they attract,” Dr Elkington said.

“But a writer’s strike would do nothing good in the longer term for shoring up that pipeline of quality feature films the global exhibition industry needs to sustain the incredible momentum built for films in cinema over the last 12 to 18 months.

“In many ways for studios, and the exhibition industry, this is the last thing needed after the disruption of COVID.”

Studio budgets are tight at a time when Wall Street wants profits from the billions of dollars spent making streaming shows.

“Entertainment conglomerates and streaming services are looking to bolster their bottom line, ratcheting back a spending spree on new content that has hurt profits,” USA Today reported last week.

“Many have reported losses to Wall Street in recent months and laid off thousands of employees. Most recently, Disney began laying off 7000 workers.”

The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) represents Amazon, Apple, CBS, Disney, NBCUniversal, Netflix, Paramount, Sony and Warner Bros Discovery, and said in a statement its goal was “to reach a fair and reasonable agreement”.

“An agreement is only possible if the guild is committed to turning its focus to serious bargaining by engaging in full discussions of the issues with the companies and searching for reasonable compromises.”