Since Tuesday, thousands of American screenwriters for television and cinema have been on strike, after the failure of negotiations with major studios and platforms. And the fallout from the writers’ strike is beginning to be felt today.
Aftermath of the fallout from the strike: several late-night shows disappear as of Tuesday evening. The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon, The Late Show With Stephen Colbert, Jimmy Kimmel Live! and Late Night With Seth Meyers, will air reruns of old shows. Comedy Central’s The Daily Show, which has no regular host, will also be rerun, as will HBO’s hosted by John Oliver and Bill Maher.
Late Monday night, representatives of the Writers Guild of America (WGA), the union that represents thousands of screenwriters for television and film, announced that negotiations with major studios had broken down.
Among the demands at the top of the list is higher pay, which screenwriters say has stagnated as television production has grown rapidly over the past 10 years. The (WGA) leaders also said that the current system no longer works and that “the survival of writing as a profession is at stake in this negotiation”.
How long will these late night shows stay off the air? The million-rated question remains open. During the last strike, they came back gradually after a few months.
The last major social movement in Hollywood dates back to the writers’ strike that paralyzed the American audiovisual industry in 2007-2008.
