OK, so there was one good deal point –one– to come out of the AMPTP talks with the WGA, as SAG-AFTRA National Executive director and Chief Negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland admitted at TIFF today: It was the streamer’s transparency on viewership numbers. “It’s a good first step,” he told Deadline after his appearance onstage at the Canadian Broadcasting Centre.
But let’s get real. “It didn’t come paired with any money,” he continued, “It was a proposal to share data with a limited set of viewers with the Writers Guild and they would come back in three years to potentially negotiate over what they thought it would be. “We’re not waiting three years to see where streaming is going, we know where streaming is going,” Crabtree-Ireland told Deadline on the streets of Toronto.
As it stands, writers and actors get paid on syndicated movies and TV series that aren’t dependent on viewership numbers. Meaning, in plain person’s talk: It doesn’t matter how many people are watching an X-Men movie on FX for the cast or scribes to get paid.
If a deal is made whereby writers or actors are paid on viewership, would that mean strictly that those on the most-viewed shows like Wednesday and Stranger Things are the only folks who get paid, and nobody else? (Because after the big programs, nobody is really watching streaming?
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