In case you've been hiding under a rock, the WGA went on strike. In the weeks leading up to the walkout, I've fielded (recorded) phone calls from John Wells (ER) and Carlton Cuse (Lost.) I've received emails from our President and the Strike Committee. I've received personal emails and numerous phone calls from my Strike Captain, instructing me where I need to report for picketing. Emphasis on need. As the most recent email form Patric Verrone (Futurama, The Simpsons), WGAw President states:
We are asking every member to contribute 20 hours a week to the strike effort, coordinating their actions either through their strike captain or the WGA strike headquarters directly. Everyone’s life circumstances are different and flexibility is both necessary and expected. If there is a personal circumstance making strike support duties impossible when requested, members are required to arrange alternate times. Adjustments will be made on a case-by-case basis through the individual captains. Flexibility should not, however, be mistaken for optional participation.
I became a member of the WGA back in 2000 when I got my first writing job on Lizzie McGuire. However, after a very successful run (seventeen episodes written, two Emmy nominations) on Disney's hit show, the phone stopped ringing and offers dried up. My writing partner (Older SlackBrother J.) did all the things you're supposed to do: we wrote spec scripts, we wrote original pilots, we wrote screenplays. We pitched show after show after show. We landed a few gigs here and there, but for the most part people just weren't interested in our Tween TV cable credits.
I went to the WGA offices to investigate the library, to see if I could check out some new material in order to help with the new spec (My Name is Earl) that we were writing. I was told that not only could I not check out the few produced Earl scripts they had, but I couldn't copy them. Shows that had already aired, scripts that I just wanted to make sure that I was following the format of the show correctly.
A few months after that, I got a letter from the WGA stating that I hadn't earned enough to qualify for insurance (the privately-held Writer's Industry Health Fund) that year. My option was to pay $326 a month for COBRA coverage. Which I did. Then when I actually needed them to cover something, they refused, leading to over $7,000 in medical bills that I had to pay out of pocket. After waging a six-month paper war where I couldn't get people on the I was finally reimbursed - five hundred dollars.
I emailed the Guild to see if they offered any sort of classes - a continuing education for the stalled writer, as I knew that I couldn't be the only one - and never heard back. Stopping by their offices I was told that I could join The Women's Committee but that was about the extent of my options.
Writers - working writers - earn decent money. While I know to the outside world that what looks like a bunch of Rich Kids bitching that they're not paid enough might fall on deaf ears, I agree with the cause. If studios and networks are earning a crapload of money off of a writer's work, then we should get compensated for that. More to the point, if you're making money off of me, I deserve a cut. I don't care if it's Internet or DVD and I think that reality television as well as animation need to fall under this banner. I am 100% in total agreement.
But the fact is that I haven't worked in ages. It's not for lack of trying, as I still spend my free time at the computer, cobbling together a new script, coming up with a new pitch, trying to rack my brain for a possible financial avenue I haven't explored or a contact that maybe I've forgotten about. Between the gym and my freelance bug-hunting (the computer-type, not the crunchy-type) I'm working nearly 50 hours a week and struggling, but I'm expected to drop everything and jump on the picket line* for twenty hours a week so the WGA because "we're in this together."
Which we are. Until the strike is over, that is. And then I'm right back where I started.
*That said, I am going to carve out some time to walk the picket line. Because I do believe in it. Because I've never been on strike before. And because I hear they are giving out free t-shirts!
The slackmistress is available for all of your non-TV writing needs. (Or TV writing needs once this strike is over.) You can check out her LinkedIn profile here.
