SOLIDARITY: Last News

As one of Reality TV’s royal family crossed the line, striking film and television writers joined forces on Wednesday in New York City with another group of culture workers involved in a pay dispute: musicians. 

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer The Writers Guild of America and other Hollywood unions on Wednesday called on the studios to reach a “fair contract” with the Directors Guild of America. In a statement, the unions said that such a contract would benefit “every worker” in the industry. “A fair contract for directors does not benefit just a select few; it uplifts every worker in the film and television industry and acknowledges the interconnected nature of our work,” said the statement issued by the WGA, SAG-AFTRA, IATSE and the Hollywood Basic Crafts. “We call on the AMPTP to immediately negotiate a fair agreement that addresses the Directors Guild of America’s unique priorities in good faith.”

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.

Piper Perabo, who plays Kevin Costner’s love interest in "Yellowstone," said she has no idea how the show will end, but if it were up to her, she would keep it going. "I have no idea what’s happening next, and the whole thing left off on this cliffhanger, so I'm waiting myself," Perabo told Entertainment Tonight in an interview released Tuesday.  In the mid-season finale, her character Summer Higgins was on house arrest in Montana while a majority of the rest of the cast was headed for Texas.  "I don't know if we start the next [episode] and they're coming back from Texas," she said.

The writers strike has entered its fifth week and is about to enter its second month and shows no sign of abating.

Sherri Shepherd paid tribute to preacher Sarah Jakes Roberts — who went viral over the weekend for having a “wig slip” during her sermon — by recreating the moment on Tuesday’s “Sherri”.

Sherri Shepherd paid tribute to preacher Sarah Jakes Roberts — who went viral over the weekend for having a «wig slip» during her sermon — by recreating the moment on Tuesday's . «If you know me, you know I love some Sarah Jakes Roberts,» Sherri told her daytime talk show audience. «I have been following her journey in ministry, I have been reading her books for a long time and I used to attend her church.» Sarah is a best-selling author, a YouTuber and the founder of the motivational organization Women Evolve. Sherri went on to explain how over the weekend, while Sarah was preaching in Dallas, Texas, her sermon was «so moving, her wig began to slide off.» Instead of running off stage to adjust her wig, Sarah took it off completely and finished her homily in just her wig cap. While detailing how inspirational Sarah was for powering through her sermon despite the hairstyle technical difficulties, Sherri jumped up and had a wig slip of her own! See the full moment in the video below! On Sunday, Sarah took to Instagram to share footage of the mid-sermon wig slip and explain why her message was more important than her appearance. «I’ve always enjoyed getting dressed up and looking my best.

Leo Barraclough International Features Editor In “The Old Oak,” which played in Competition in Cannes, Ken Loach portrays a village in the North-East of England where the indigenous white community comes into conflict with Syrian refugees – a conflict fuelled by the despair, deprivation and decline of the rust-belt region. Such conditions can be a seed-bed for far right groups, the director tells Variety. Such issues have not been explored sufficiently in film and television, Loach says, and he draws a parallel with the portrayal of the rise of Nazism in Germany in the mass media. “We have endless programs about the Second World War, about the horrors of Nazism and fascism, about the racism, about the Holocaust. Quite properly, we have endless programs about that, but what they refuse to point out is that that arose from alienation, anger, feeling cheated, and finding scapegoats. And that’s how we ended up with Hitler, and that’s the ground in which the far right flourishes. One of the points of the film is to say: This is the cause of fascism. This is where it comes from. This is its seed-bed, and it comes as an inevitable consequence of our economic system. Because if the neoliberal agenda was an essential development for capitalism, to use the old-fashioned word, then that’s where fascism comes from. Implicit in that is that the far right will rise because that’s how people will be heading. And they know that and yet the mass media, the press, just turn their backs on that. They’ll tell us all about the horrors of Hitler. Sure. But they won’t tell us how he came to power. And that’s the huge lesson. And we see it in essence now all the time.”

The Writers Guild of America West received the most robust support from their sister unions in Los Angeles at the “Unions Strike Back” Rally on Friday evening.

EXCLUSIVE: A solidarity assistance fund that the Writers Guild and several of its prominent members established to help non-members during the guild’s ongoing strike has now grown to over $2.2 million and has already helped more than 400 industry members. The needs-based fund is administered by the Entertainment Community Fund, formerly known as the Actors Fund.

Owen Gleiberman Chief Film Critic Tommy Joe Ballantyne (Dave Turner), the central character in Ken Loach’s “The Old Oak,” is a middle-aged landlord and proprietor of a pub that sits near the bottom of a sloped street of working-class row houses. We’re in an unnamed village in the northeast of England, and the pub, called the Old Oak, has seen better days. So has Tommy, who’s known as TJ. Dave Turner, the very good actor who plays him, resembles a bone-weary cross between John C. Reilly and Michael Moore. There’s a sweet-souled directness to his sad prole stare, and he treats his customers, some of whom he has known since they were in grade school together, with quiet affection and respect. But the pub is falling apart, and the property values in the neighborhood have plunged. TJ is barely scraping by serving pints of bitters.

What could well be Ken Loach’s final film has as much fire and fury as his debut Poor Cow did in 1967, if we discount his pioneering TV work in the run-up. The visual style hasn’t changed a great deal in the years since, but that’s because the British movie veteran, soon to turn 87, isn’t much fussed about surfaces, it’s the inner lives of his characters that he wants to capture. In that respect, The Old Oak would make a fitting swansong, capping the recent North-East trilogy with a vital film that is clearly the work of the team behind previous Cannes Competition hits I, Daniel Blake and Sorry We Missed You.

Jennifer Maas TV Business Writer Former President Barack Obama opened Netflix’s livestream event for his new docuseries, “Working: What We Do All Day,” on Thursday with a more aggressive statement of support for the Writers Guild of America (WGA) than what he initially said in solidarity with the ongoing writers strike. Before the panel, which aired on LinkedIn at 5 p.m. ET/2 p.m. PT, got underway, moderator Ira Glass revealed Obama had prepared remarks he wanted to deliver about the WGA’s work stoppage, which is currently in its fourth week. “Part of what this show ‘Working’ is about is how certain things are constant about the work experience. People trying to find work that’s satisfying, people trying to pay the bills,” Obama said. “Unfortunately one of the things that’s also been constant is the struggle for people to make sure their employers are treating them fairly and they’re getting a fair share of the pie. I think what we’ve seen throughout American history is that unions and worker organizations have had to make demands on their employers, those that are controlling whatever industry they’re in, to make sure they’re treated fairly and entertainment is no exception. My hope would be that in a time of big technological change, where you’ve got big mega corporations that are doing really well, that they keep in mind the creative people who are actually making the product that consumers appreciate and that gets exported all around the world.

Warner Bros. Discovery has corrected changes it made to director and writer credits in its rollout of Max after receiving harsh blowback from the Directors Guild and the Writers Guild. In a statement today, Max said: “We agree that the talent behind the content on Max deserve their work to be properly recognized. We will correct the credits, which were altered due to an oversight in the technical transition from HBO Max to Max and we apologize for this mistake.”

Editor’s Note: The co-creator & showrunner of Mrs. Davis, Tara Hernandez has put artificial intelligence at the core of her creativity in the just completed Peacock limited series. Today, in a guest column on the Writers Guild of American strike, the Young Sheldon writers’ room alumna takes a different POV on AI and the notion of the individual in a greater collective

Marta Balaga Natacha Kaganski has joined Luxbox as festivals and acquisitions manager and Solène Colomer has been named sales & marketing coordinator.   Previously, Kaganski spent four years as acquisitions manager at Wild Bunch, where she handled deals for the French and international market as well as coordination for multi-territories deals with the Wild Bunch group, such as Germany, Spain and Italy.  She was involved in films likeVenice winner “Happening” by Audrey Diwan, Gaspar Noé’s “Vortex” or “Leila’s Brothers,” also taking part in first Wild Bunch productions.

Chernobai walked for the premiere of Just Philippot's Acide wearing a blue and yellow gown—the colors of the Ukraine flag—without incident, seemingly invited to the event. But when she reached the steps leading up to the screening, she removed two packets of fake blood from her cleavage and broke them over her head as an apparent protest against her country's invasion by Russia.

Hundreds of anti-racism supporters turned up in Erskine at the weekend to decry the way asylum seekers being housed there have been treated by far-right extremist groups seeking to have them removed.

Ethan Shanfeld The Los Angeles Dodgers have re-invited The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence to the team’s Pride Night following a public outcry after the Dodgers rescinded the activist organization’s initial invitation to the event. “After much thoughtful feedback from our diverse communities, honest conversations with the Los Angeles Dodgers organization and generous discussions with the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, the Los Angeles Dodgers would like to offer our sincerest apologies to the [Sisters], members of the LGBTQ+ community and their friends and families,” the team said in a statement, adding that the group has “agreed to receive the gratitude of our collective of our collective communities for the lifesaving work that they have done tirelessly for decades.”

James Cromwell, nominated for a Best Supporting Actor Oscar in 1995 for his role in Babe, expressed solidarity today for the WGA members who are out on strike.

As the Writers Guild strike stretches into its fourth week, Michael Schur is feeling resolute.