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Our special correspondent Lu Ke

With the box office success of new summer movies such as Inside Out 2 and Despicable Me 4, Hollywood's popularity seems to have returned to the level of previous years. However, American film and television practitioners and media have not forgotten the "lessons" of last year: the strike jointly initiated by the Writers Guild and the Actors Guild caused Hollywood to shut down for several months, and the number of works was greatly reduced and postponed, and the subsequent impact has been felt to this day. On the first anniversary of the Hollywood strike, media such as The Hollywood Reporter and Variety reviewed the turmoil through a large number of interviews and follow-up reports, and found that the interests and rights that screenwriters and actors had fought for were not fully implemented, but instead fell into a more serious unemployment problem.

Total production fell 37%

Due to dissatisfaction with salary, job opportunities and the threat of artificial intelligence (AI), the Writers Guild of America started a strike last summer, negotiating with the management on behalf of 11,000 screenwriters, which had a significant impact on the production of the American film and television industry. Later, the Screen Actors Guild of America, which has 160,000 members, also joined the strike. This is the first time that the two major unions have joined forces to strike since 1960, and this move has directly put Hollywood into a shutdown dilemma.

After a long bargaining, the Producers Guild of America, which represents the interests of Hollywood capitalists, reached a settlement agreement with the two major unions at the end of September last year. After reaching a consensus on screenwriters' salaries and actor dividends, ensuring the scale of project employees, and strengthening control over the use of artificial intelligence, Hollywood practitioners returned to work in October last year. However, this nearly three or four-month strike has seriously delayed the progress of many movies, series, and TV shows, and its destructive power has continued until this summer. In addition, according to industry media such as The Hollywood Reporter, the wages and bonuses that screenwriters have fought for have not been fully obtained, and the number of jobs and employment rates in the entire industry have been even lower.

"Although the entire industry has gradually emerged from the labor dispute since October last year, Hollywood still feels like it's on the Titanic. These creative practitioners feel that they are becoming increasingly devalued, and major studios are actively cutting costs and reorganizing their businesses." The Hollywood Reporter found that compared with the same period in 2022, the total output of the US film and television industry has fallen by 37% in the past six months this year, resulting in insufficient production, and some screenwriters and actors cannot even meet the minimum income threshold to guarantee medical insurance. Therefore, looking back on the reasons and demands of the strike today, whether they are reasonable, and whether the new contract won by the union has improved the lives of practitioners, different interviewers give different answers.

'One of the biggest self-injuries'

David Slack, a board member of the Writers Guild of America, said: "The strike is absolutely correct. The protection measures for artificial intelligence are particularly effective." However, some screenwriters/producers who wish to remain anonymous disagree: "Last year's screenwriters' strike was one of the biggest self-inflicted injuries. The shutdown caused by the strike gave those production companies time to reflect on their previous model and consider how to further drastically cut costs."

Actor Thomas Oshra believes that strikes are useful. He said, "Strikes played a positive role in the early stages of negotiations, which shows that when people are closely united, they can go further." However, in the eyes of studio executives, the strike has dealt a heavy blow to the business, especially at a delicate moment when the traditional film and television industry is being integrated into the streaming media business by Wall Street. The strike has exacerbated the shrinkage of the industry. The union insists that the industry has reached a "life-and-death" moment. "We had to do it at the time, otherwise the production companies would never agree to those agreements. If necessary, we will do it again."

Hollywood employers and unions still take different positions on this strike. Although a year has passed, given the long-term nature of film and television projects and industry development, it is still not enough to make a final judgment on the "merits and demerits" of the strike. The media predicts that the subsequent impact will take a few years to truly manifest.

However, disputes are now very intense over certain specific terms. For example, one of the main rights that the Writers Guild negotiated for last year is the "mini studio." Film and television projects that adopt this model employ fewer screenwriters and have a shorter creative cycle than regular programs, so filmmakers can control costs more easily.

However, the union believes that this mini-model exploits practitioners and insists that the film company must hire at least 3 to 6 screenwriters and receive more additional compensation. Although the film company conceded on this item, the consequence is that they do not want to have "mini studios" in the future. Instead of being monitored by the union for the minimum number of employees and compensation bonuses, it is better to directly hire independent screenwriters to complete all the work. Regarding this development caused by the strike, Hollywood practitioners have different opinions. Some criticized that this led to a decrease in the number of projects, while some screenwriters believed that their income did increase after receiving the work.

The film company has not yet fully fulfilled its promise

Members of the Hollywood Actors Guild are also staring at another item that is closely related to their income - the landing of streaming on-demand dividends. Last year's new contract stipulates that 75% of the bonus will be distributed to these actors, but now it is still unclear how the money will be distributed. Kevin McCorkle, director of the Los Angeles Actors Guild, said: "The terms of this bonus pool are very complicated and must meet some prerequisites. We still don't understand the details. So far, the Actors Guild has only received the first batch of data for projects that meet the terms in the first quarter of this year."

In addition, there is another major clause that the screenwriters and actors' unions are paying close attention to, but it is also full of variables: the use of artificial intelligence. Last year, the union obtained a commitment to prohibit the use of AI to write scripts or generate materials, and the film company must obtain the consent of the actors themselves before creating and using their "digital images" to prevent real characters from being replaced.

However, with the rapid development of AI technology, the previous clauses have not been implemented in time. This year, actor Nandini Bapat and stuntman Mary Fink were required to agree to use "digital synthetic images" in their contracts. Faced with the powerful Warner Company, the two practitioners hesitated and gave up signing. The former completed the performance after refusing to be scanned, while the latter failed to get a job opportunity. This shows that Hollywood film companies have not yet fully fulfilled their promises.

In addition to creating scripts and copying actors' images, artificial intelligence can also reproduce actors' voices. In this regard, there is still a certain game between Hollywood producers, technology companies and actors. In May this year, OpenAI, a leading AI company, used the voice of Hollywood actress Scarlett Johansson to create AI voices without her consent. Although it apologized afterwards, it was still regarded as a provocation to personal dignity and union clauses, and also exposed the drawback that laws and regulations often lag behind technological development.

In the view of the British newspaper The Guardian, last year's Hollywood strike certainly reached a certain consensus on wages, streaming media dividends and artificial intelligence supervision, "but this sense of relief and joy is mixed with fear. Hollywood can no longer return to the old days. Screenwriters and actors who get higher salaries find that there are fewer job opportunities. The development strategies of various streaming media are still undecided, and whether artificial intelligence will really become "a tool" requires people to return to a rational perspective. But on the bright side, the new contract after last year's strike at least allows people to actively face future changes." ▲