American film and television writers on Monday announced an industry-wide general strike for the first time in 15 years, as Hollywood prepares to recover from the potential wide-ranging fallout from a fair wage battle in the broadcast age.
The Writers Guild of America said 11,500 screenwriters would take part in the sit-in on Tuesday.
Negotiations between the studios and writers, which began in March, failed to result in new signings before existing writers’ deals expired shortly after midnight, at 12:01 a.m. PT Tuesday.
The union told its members to stop writing the script immediately.
The Board of Directors of the Writers Guild of America voted unanimously to call the strike, which will begin at midnight, and said the writers were facing an “existential crisis.”
The Motion Picture and Television Producers Alliance, the trade union that negotiates on behalf of studios and production companies, indicated late Monday that negotiations did not reach an agreement before the current contract expired.
Hollywood.. the entertainment industry or promotion?
