This afternoon’s announcement of a “tentative” three-year deal between the Directors Guild and the Association of Motion Picture and Television Producers means the heat is really on the Writers Guild negotiators to arrive at some kind of similar agreement with the AMPTP. On strike since 11.5, the WGA apparently hasn’t even had back-channel talks going on with the AMPTP since talks collapsed on 12.7 over producer demands that the guild abandon six of its proposals.
If the WGA guys have any balls at all, they’ll disparage the DGA deal and get out their shovels and dig deeper foxholes and lob fresh grenades. Their manhood and dignity is on the line. Is it better to die standing up than to survive on your knees, or is it better to live standing up rather than die on your knees?
Being a little out of the loop with Sundance, I thought I’d check in on Nikki Finke‘s Deadline Hollywood Daily to see if she has some idea what the writers think about the DGA deal (which, according to Variety, boosts the residuals formula for paid internet downloads by double the current rate and establishing residual rates for ad-supported streaming and use of clips on the Internet) and whether they can live with a similar terms. But Finke is on vacation until 1.22 — great timing!