Information Sharing Required By WGA’s Historic Agency Franchise Deal To Play Key Role In Film & TV Contract Talks

EXCLUSIVE: There was “fire and brimstone” at tonight’s WGA membership meeting – the last to be held before the start of contract negotiations with the AMPTP on Monday. The meeting, held via Zoom, was led by the co-chairs of the guild’s negotiating committee: former WGA West presidents Chris Keyser and David A. Goodman.

Leaders of the Writers Guild of America won’t discuss the specifics of the contract proposals they’ve exchanged with the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers. But in an interview with Deadline on Tuesday ahead of next week’s start of negotiations, they made it perfectly clear a deal can be reached without a strike if the companies take the needs of writers seriously.

Saying that “writers are not keeping up,” the WGA said today that its upcoming negotiations for a new film and TV contract “must significantly address writer compensation.” The talks are set to begin March 20, and the current contract expires May 1.

Now, this is a MAJOR power play!

Canadian filmmaker Sarah Polley won the Best Adapted Screenplay award last night for “Women Talking,” her fourth feature-length film. The award was her second Oscar nomination and first win— she was nominated for Best Adapted Screenplay before for her feature-length debut, “Away From Her” in 2008.

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Jazz Tangcay Artisans Editor Zaib Shaikh, Canada’s Consul General to Los Angeles, hosted the country’s annual Canada at the Oscars soiree Thursday at his official residence in Hancock Park. The event was the first stop of the night for many Oscar-nominated Canadians including “Women Talking’s” Sarah Polley, Sheila McCarthy and Kate Hallet. Polley was headed to the Macro party. Other attendees were going to the Oscar Wilde Awards or the South Asian Excellence Pre-Oscars Celebration. Also in attendance were “Turning Red’s” Domee Shi, who landed an Oscar for best animated feature, Brendan Fraser and “The Whale” prosthetics makeup designer Adrien Morot.

As expected, WGA members have voted overwhelmingly to approve a Pattern of Demands for the guild’s upcoming film and TV contract negotiations, which are set to begin March 20. The combined vote of the WGA West and the WGA East was 5,553 (98.4%) voting yes, and 90 (1.6%) voting no. The WGA’s current contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers expires May 1 amid growing concerns about a possible writers’ strike.

Gene Maddaus Senior Media Writer The WGA announced Tuesday that 98.4% of members had voted in favor of the “pattern of demands,” a loose outline of topics for discussion in upcoming negotiations. The vote was not unexpected, but does signal a broad consensus around issues like wages, streaming residuals and “mini-rooms.” The negotiations are set to begin on March 20, ahead of the May 1 expiration of the current contract.

The DGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers will begin negotiations for a new film and TV contract on May 10. The DGA’s current contract expires June 30.

Princess Andre looks to be walking in her parents' footsteps as she prepares to carve out a career for herself in the world of fame. The 15-year-old is set follow the likes of Love Island's Molly Mae and Gemma Owen as she looks to sign a deal with a major fashion giant.

Cynthia Littleton Business Editor Meredith Stiehm, president of the WGA West, got right to the point in her remarks Sunday at the guild’s 2023 award ceremony. With contract negotiations less than two weeks aways, Stiehm rallied the troops about the need for solidarity, and she emphasized the guild’s role as serving as the “good sheriff” helping to tame the Wild West for writers. The guild, Stiehm told the crowd at the Fairmont Century Plaza, is “walking around like Gary Cooper — low key but watchful, vigilent and a little swagger.” The guild is “looking to keep the peace” but is devoted to enforcing the rules established by its contracts. “The guild says there are rules, there are laws,” she said referring to a fight that the WGA recently settled over $42 million in residual payments owed to guild members.

Cynthia Littleton Business Editor The Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers have settled on March 20 to begin negotiations on a new master TV and film contract. The clock is already ticking and strike fears are growing. The WGA’s current contract expires May 1. The issues that the scribe tribe will place on the charcoal-gray table in the enormous conference room at the AMPTP’s Sherman Oaks headquarters have come into sharp focus in recent months. Just about everybody agrees that the compensation standards for writers — as well as actors and directors, whose unions will also hold contract talks this year — have been outmoded by the streaming revolution. The hard part will be reaching a compromise on how to adapt them.

The WGA has issued its Pattern of Demands ahead of its negotiations with the AMPTP.

Brent Lang Executive Editor Jennifer Nettles has joined the cast of “The Exorcist,” the first film in the new horror trilogy. Details of her part haven’t been revealed, but it’s described as a “primary role.” She joins a cast that includes Leslie Odom Jr., Ann Dowd, Lidya Jewett and Ellen Burstyn, who is reprising her role as Chris MacNeil from the 1973 original. The new take on the possession story is being produced by Blumhouse and Morgan Creek for Universal and Peacock. The first film in the trilogy will be released theatrically on Oct. 13, 2023. Nettles is known for both her acting and her music. She most recently played Jenna Hunterson in the Broadway musical “Waitress.” Nettles also appears on HBO’s “The Righteous Gemstones” and had a supporting role in the Oscar-nominated Harriet Tubman biopic, “Harriet.” She is a judge on TBS’ competition series “Go-Big Show” and will host Fox’s “The Farmer Wants a Wife.”

A red carpet return. Riley Keough stepped out at the Thursday, February 23, premiere of Daisy Jones & The Six.

Riley Keough has made her first red carpet appearance since the shock death of her mother, Lisa Marie Presley.The actress, 33, had her husband Ben Smith-Petersen close by her side as she attended the premiere for her upcoming miniseries Daisy Jones & The Six on Thursday evening, weeks after her mother Lisa Marie passed away from a cardiac arrest. Riley, who is the only daughter of Lisa Marie and musician Danny Keough and the granddaughter of Elvis Presley, looked beautiful in a plunging black dress with a glittery skirt, which she paired with a pair of ornate green earrings and long silk-style gloves.

The WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers will begin negotiations for a new film and TV contract on March 20. “The AMPTP is fully committed to reaching a fair and reasonable deal that brings strength and stability to the industry,” the AMPTP said in a statement Wednesday.

The WGA will hold the last of its four scheduled membership meetings about its upcoming contract negotiations Thursday: one at the Sheraton Universal in Universal City, CA and at the other at the School of Visual Arts Theatre in New York City.

Angelique Jackson The cast of Ava DuVernay’s latest film, inspired by Pulitzer Prize winner Isabel Wilkerson’s “Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents,” is now complete with the addition of Blair Underwood, Finn Wittrock, Victoria Pedretti, Isha Blaaker, Leonardo Nam, Donna Mills and Emily Yancy. The seven actors join Oscar nominee Aunjanue Ellis, who was previously announced as the lead in the film, as well as Oscar nominee Vera Farmiga, Niecy Nash-Betts, Nick Offerman, Jon Bernthal, Audra McDonald, Connie Nielsen, Jasmine Cephas Jones and Myles Frost. Announced in October 2020, DuVernay serves as the writer and director of “Caste,” which adapts Wilkerson’s acclaimed book. Described in The New York Times as “an instant American classic and almost certainly the keynote nonfiction book of the American century thus far,” the book — and subsequently DuVernay’s film — examines the system of hierarchy that has shaped America.