Wga East: Last News

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer The Directors Guild of America is continuing its negotiations with the AMPTP, as companies hope to get a deal that could play a role in ending the two-week-old writers strike. Meanwhile, the Writers Guild of America told members Monday that the guild is winning the “PR war” against the studios, as members share their stories in the media. “It seems the whole world is on our side,” wrote Lisa Takeuchi Cullen, a WGA East vice president, in an email to members titled “Our Momentum Grows.” “Members’ individual stories of our broken system — of getting by on ten weeks of work a year, of residual checks amounting to pennies — are resonating with the public. They understand we are losing out on the middle-class American Dream. We are not the elite. We are just like them. We are them.”

The Writers Guild of America East and West members at CBS News have ratified a new three-year collective bargaining agreement with the company.

Artificial intelligence is taking center stage in yet another set of union negotiations as the Writers Guild of America began talks this week with CBS News on a new collective bargaining agreement.

Members at the Writers Guild of America East have “overwhelmingly” ratified a new three-year deal with ABC News.

Emiliana Betancourt The Writers Guild of America East is set to present Kathy McGee, an Emmy Award-winning writer and producer at WCBS-TV, with the Richard B. Jablow Award for Devoted Service to 2025 WGA Awards. The 77th edition of the annual event will be held at New York’s Edison Ballroom on Feb.

SAG-AFTRA‘s Duncan Crabtree-Ireland was the highest paid among the Hollywood union leaders and the ninth highest-paid labor official in the country last year.

William Earl Writers employed by “Sesame Street” producer Sesame Workshop have voted unanimously to support a strike authorization vote from the Writers Guild of America as the April 19 expiration of the current contract approaches. The 35 writers represented by the union have been in negotiations with the production company behind “Sesame Street” and other children’s programs since February.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer The Writers Guild of America (WGA) and other unions representing film and TV writers and journalists sent a letter to Congress Thursday urging protections for their industries in any legislation regarding Artificial Intelligence. Addressed to Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, the letter was co-signed by the NewsGuild-CWA, Writers Guild of America East (WGAE), Writers Guild of America West (WGAW), and National Association of Broadcast Employees and Technicians (NABET-CWA).

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer The Writers Guild of America East has tapped Sam Wheeler as the union’s new executive director. Chosen by the WGA East council as successor to longtime WGA East leader Lowell Peterson, who exited his post last October after the conclusion of the writers strike, Wheeler enters the role after serving as the national executive director of the American Guild of Musical Artists (AGMA) since 2022.

BreAnna Bell The drinks were flowing and the guests were energized with a renewed sense of promise as writers gathered to celebrate their Humanitas wins as well as a new deal with the AMPTP at the Humanitas Prizes Toast on Thursday night. Held almost one month after the WGA ratified its new contract officially ending the summer-long writers strike, this year’s event was moved from its usual hotel ballroom location to Hollywood nightclub Avalon, out of respect for the Local 11 Unite Here hotel workers who remain on strike for fair and livable wages — a cause that all in the room shouted their support for once announced on stage by co-MCs Lennon Parham and Jessica St.

Cynthia Littleton Business Editor Lowell Peterson‘s tenure as executive director of the Writers Guild of America East was destined to be bookended by strikes. After 15 years at the helm, Peterson will step down from his post as of Nov. 15 when his current three-year contract expires.

EXCLUSIVE: As the striking actors guild sits down today with the studio bosses for the first new talks in over 80 days, the writers are one step closer to officially ending their nearly 150-day labor dispute with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer The strike is over, but the fight is not yet won. On Wednesday, as the 2023 Writers Guild of America strike formally ended after 148 days, Variety spoke with newly elected WGA East president Lisa Takeuchi Cullen and WGA East executive director Lowell Peterson about the end of the work stoppage at the East coast guild’s membership meeting to discuss their tentative three-year MBA agreement with the Hollywood studios.

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Padma Lakshmi wants a man … a gold man, that is. After 16 Primetime Emmy nominations throughout her career, she makes no qualms about wanting to make a trip to the stage to accept a statuette. She’s double nominated this year for outstanding host for a reality or competition program for Bravo’s “Top Chef” and outstanding hosted nonfiction series or special for Hulu’s “Taste the Nation.” Lakshmi has emceed the Bravo series for 17 years and in June, she announced, via social media, that she would be exiting after the recently aired 20th season.

The hand-drawn picket signs were, like several of the people carrying them, wrapped in waterproof plastic at a rain-soaked march in New York City on Tuesday afternoon. But a passer-by could still see the images: Bender, the cranky robot from Futurama; BoJack, the half-equine hero of BoJack Horseman; Courage, the pink-hued canine star of Courage the Cowardly Dog; and several more beloved cartoon and animation characters going back the original, Mickey Mouse. 

SAG-AFTRA will hold a mass rally in Times Square on Tuesday morning. It’s expected to be the biggest rally in NYC since the strike began on July 14. Celebs scheduled to attend the “Rock the City for a Fair Contract” rally include Bryan Cranston, Steve Buscemi, Christian Slater, Lauren Ambrose, Christine Baranski, Matt Bomer, Tituss Burgess, Liza Colón-Zayas, Gregory Diaz, Jennifer Ehle, Nancy Giles, Danai Gurrira, Jill Hennessy, Marin Hinkle, Stephen Lang, Arian Moayed, Wendell Pierce, Corey Stoll and Merritt Wever.

It’s Day 5 of the SAG-AFTRA strike and Day 79 of the WGA strike. 

The scene outside Silvercup Studios on Thursday was the same as it has been for weeks.

Ryan Murphy is responding allegations.

Joe Otterson TV Reporter As WGA pickets continue to mobilize at the remaining TV shows in both New York and Los Angeles, at least one Ryan Murphy-produced show was the focus of striking writers’ efforts on Wednesday: “American Horror Story: Delicate.” The show is currently shooting on 52nd street in Manhattan, according to several WGA East member Twitter feeds — including one person who posted video of star Kim Kardashian entering the production. “It doesn’t appear that @KimKardashian is a friend of the labor movement. She just now crossed our picket line to work on Ryan Murphy’s @AHSFX Hamptons, shooting here on 52nd in NYC,” wrote “The Blacklist” exec producer and WGA strike captain T Cooper on his Twitter account.

The leaders of the Writers Guild, SAG-AFTRA, IATSE and the Teamsters have issued a “joint statement of solidarity” with the Directors Guild in its final scheduled week of contract negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, saying that they “stand alongside our sisters, brothers, and kin in the DGA in their pursuit of a fair contract.” Their statement comes on the 30th day of the ongoing WGA strike and 21 days after the DGA began its contract talks with the AMPTP.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Colin Farrell, Mariska Hargitay, Danny Strong, Paula Pell, Rachel Dratch, Michael Kelly and Craig Zobel were among the stars who came out to the writers strike picket line outside Paramount Global’s New York City office in Times Square Thursday. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D.-N.Y., and local politicians spoke at the event in support of the Writers Guild of America’s (WGA) cause against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) that has led to a four-week-and-counting work stoppage due to the organizations’ inability to ink a new contract May 1. “This is about what’s right. We’ve seen income inequality grow exponentially over the last decade; and in your business, it has never been more present,” Gillibrand said to the crowd, filled with not only WGA members, but also those from SAG-AFTRA, IATSE and Teamsters, among other unions. “We see writers working hard every day to produce content and we have an unfair playing field. Not only does AI want to displace our writers, they simply can’t. AI generates content based on what’s been written before the work you did last year, and the year before. It’s not original. It’s not imaginative. It doesn’t come from the human heart. It’s not about a human experience. It’s not about what people actually want to learn about or know about or see or experience. That is what writers bring to the equation every single time. So this strike is so important for the future of this country. It’s about the value of workers; workers and what they create is fundamentally valuable.”