More Hollywood writers do end-run around studio system
The strike is over, but some top writers are still exploring ways to turn the Internet into a new business model.
By Daniel B. Woodand Gloria Goodale | Staff writers of The Christian Science Monitorfrom the February 22, 2008 edition
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Los Angeles - The searchlights, red-carpet couture, and teary-eyed thank-yous will be back in place this Sunday for ABC's worldwide Oscar telecast. That's because the striking Hollywood writers came back to work just in the nick of time.
But behind the appearance of business-as-usual in the world of movies and TV is a shifting entertainment universe that is anything but. While the striking writers had their pens down and union hackles up, many were seeking creative new ways to rewrite the rules of engagement with the industry.
That means scores of adventurous, often-angry film and TV scribes reaching out to find new partners – venture capitalists, equity firms, advertisers – who can promise greater ownership, control, and independence within the new media world. The trend includes various ways to skirt studio bosses to reach consumers directly on the Web.
The trend was already percolating before the strike but exploded with new life during what became a contentious, three-month work stoppage. Now it is continuing with vigor as the 10,500-member-strong union returns to a dwindling number of studio jobs.
"A growing number of writers are trying to navigate from the prestrike world to the poststrike world by asking the question, 'How do we become smart and entrepreneurial on our own?' " says Tom Smuts, cofounder of the Berkman Center for the Internet and Society at Harvard Law School and a Writers Guild member. "They're asking how we can proceed with new models, new ideas, in a way that doesn't recreate the studio system we all complain about."
Suspicious of studios
In recent years, as studios and networks explored ways to make money from TV shows and movies on the Internet, their reluctance to pay writers led to the strike. Terms of the new agreement now include a percentage of the profits for writers from the emerging digital platforms.
But the possibilities that many writers explored while off work have led them to believe it's time for a more fundamental change.
"The strike has caused skepticism and acrimony toward the studio system. Because of that, a lot of writers are doing their own website and creating content so that they don't need the studios' help," says Dyan Traynor, a WGA writer who has penned several pilots for Fox and A&E.
Premium content from established writers is already finding a place and audience online. Top comedy writer Seth MacFarlane ("Family Guy") has inked a deal for an animated series directly for the Internet. Award-winning dramatic writers Marshall Herskovitz and Ed Zwick ("thirtysomething," "Once and Again") are other prime examples of writers who set up shop on the Internet.
This past fall, the writing duo took their new drama "quarterlife" directly to the Internet instead of shopping a traditional pilot to a broadcast network. More important, they funded it themselves and then turned around and licensed it to NBC, who will begin airing it next week, thus reversing a decades-old pattern of being writers for hire.
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