Max Credits SNAFU Could Take Weeks To Fix; Execs Didn’t Know About New “Creators” Label Until After Launch

deadline.com:

EXCLUSIVE: Warner Bros Discovery promised to give writers and directors proper credit on its Max streaming service, but don’t expect the fix to happen anytime soon. “This could take weeks with all the data that needs to be transferred, checked, finalized,” said one studio insider of the May 23 streamer launch SNAFU that attracted outrage and ire from striking scribes and negotiating filmmakers this week. “It is not a simple as pressing a button.” But it did hit a nerve. “Warner Bros has lumped writers, directors and producers into an invented, diminishing category they call Creators,” WGA West chief Meredith Stiehm said on Wednesday in a joint release with DGA boss Lesli Linka Glatter on the Max rollout. “This is a credits violation for starters.

But worse, it is disrespectful and insulting to the artists that make the films and TV shows that make their corporation billions.”  As it stands, Jesse Armstrong is still listed among a coterie of non-alphabetical “Creators” for the about the conclude Succession.

Regardless of the inclusion of executive producers Will Farrell and Adam McKay among the Succession Creators squad currently on display on Max, Armstrong is the sole creator of the Emmy winning satire.

In fact, despite the frustration (to put it politely) many writers, directors, producers, and others feel at being lumped together as “Creators” on the Max credits pages, the promised process to “correct the credits” will take weeks in the best of scenarios. “From Roku to Apple and more, you have to do this platform-by-platform and that takes time,” a streamer exec told Deadline. “The number of platforms will be a determining factor in how long it’ll takes overall,” he added, noting the old credits that existed on HBO