From United Hollywood

Potential DGA deal looming

clipped from unitedhollywood.blogspot.com This is still a rumor, but it's definitely gaining steam -- word is spreading that the DGA has finalized a deal with the congloms, and will announce the deal tomorrow. We don't know what the terms of the deal will be, if indeed it does exist. We're not going to speculate because, if it's true, we'll find out the specifics soon enough. But we over at UH will make one suggestion: everyone stay calm. That's the only way we can really be prepared for the unexpected -- is to stop expecting anything. When and if the DGA announces their deal, it will take some time for all of us to analyze the terms of that deal and see if they're acceptable to us as a guild or not. We're inevitably going to argue and disagree; we'll need to do it civilly, and calmly.

1ST SIGN OF THINGS TO COME

AMPTP AND DGA AGREE TO BEGIN FORMAL CONTRACT NEGOTIATIONS; Apted Says "Within Shouting Distance"

The AMPTP just made this announcement. Talks begin tomorrow and I'm told this news reflects significant "progress." Indeed, DGA President Michael Apted told members in a letter today "We would not enter negotiations with the AMPTP unless we were within shouting distance of an agreement on our two most important issues: jurisdiction for our members to work in new media and appropriate compensation for the reuse of our work on the Internet and other new media platforms." But Apted also noted: "There are still hurdles to jump."

AMPTP REACHES OUT

CBS Chief Moonves Wants to Get Back to Table With Writers

Says “Steps Being Taken” to Restart Talks

By Mike Farrell -- Multichannel News, 1/10/2008 1:27:00 PM

CBS head honcho Les Moonves hinted at an industry conference Thursday that the television giant is trying to restart negotiations with the striking Writers Guild of America, but offered no details as to what that those efforts entail.

Moonves, speaking at the Citigroup Entertainment, Media & Telecommunications conference in Phoenix, stressed that the writers strike is not having an adverse impact on the network so far.

“We sincerely hope that the talks begin shortly and that there is a resolution,” Moonves said. “I can tell you there are some steps that are being taken to push that ahead, and we hope that reasonable people prevail and that we can make a go of it in the near future.”

WGA STRIKE - THE VIEW FROM HERE

I thought I would bring in the new year with my prediction for the next moves in the AMPTP v. WGA chess match. I see the AMPTP waiting for the psychological impact of the returning late shows combined with an initial conversation or two with the DGA to fan the flames of the already substantial anxiety created by their silence before reluctantly suggesting a return to the table through back-channel reduction of their “ultimatum” down to the jurisdiction and sympathy strike issues. They hope the WGA will drop jurisdiction which will help them on the DGA front, but once back at the table they will not make a counter offer to the WGA proposal. They will find a long-winded way of representing their initial offer in different clothes. They will leak significant progress with the DGA while pressing the writers to cave on financial definition issues.

I can't wait to see how reality matches up with my predictions.

"Why Do We Write?"

In the spirit of the WGA’s “Why We Write” campaign, I thought I’d share this letter from F. Scott Fitzgerald to Maxwell Perkins, his editor at Scribners, on the occasion of the publication of “The Great Gatsby.” Ah—the writer’s life! Enjoy.


Marseille, en route to Paris
Early April 1925
Dear Max:
Your telegram depressed me—I hope I’ll find better news in Paris and am wiring you from Lyons. There’s nothing to say until I hear more. If the book fails commercially it will be from one of two reasons or both
1st The title is only fair, rather bad than good.
2nd And most important—the book contains no important woman character and women control the fiction market at present. I don’t think the unhappy end matters particularly.
It will have to sell 20,000 copies to wipe out my debt to you. I think it will do that all right—but my hope was it would do 75,000. This week will tell.

In all events I have a book of good stories for this fall. Now I shall write some cheap ones until I’ve accumulated enough for my next novel. When that is finished and published I’ll wait and see. If it will support me with no more intervals of trash I’ll go on as a novelist. If not I’m going to quit, come home, go to Hollywood and learn the movie business. I can’t reduce our scale of living and I can’t stand this financial insecurity. Anyhow there’s no point in trying to be an artist if you can’t do your best. I had my chance back in 1920 to start my life on a sensible scale and I lost it and so I’ll have to pay the penalty. Then perhaps at 40 I can start writing again without this constant worry and interruption

Yours in great depression
Scott

Common Ground

What do Democrats and an Iraqi Islamic Militia Ruler have In common? The desperate need for a U.S. withdrawal date.

clipped from www.latimes.com Sadr's bloc quits Iraq's ruling coalition BAGHDAD -- -- The parliament bloc loyal to influential cleric Muqtada Sadr walked out of Iraq's ruling Shiite coalition Saturday, further aggravating rifts inside the country's largest religious sect and loosening the alliance's grip on power. "The main problem in Iraq now is the occupation, and the solution is to have a timetable for the withdrawal of occupiers, and anyone who agrees with us on this demand will find our hearts opened to him," lawmaker Nassar Rubaie said.

Slippery Slope

More food for thought as thing heat up in the Middle East.

clipped from www.nytimes.com WASHINGTON, June 15 — A year after President Bush and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice announced a new strategy toward Iran, a behind-the-scenes debate has broken out within the administration over whether the approach has any hope of reining in Iran’s nuclear program, according to senior administration officials. Even beyond its nuclear program, Iran is emerging as an increasing source of trouble for the Bush administration by inflaming the insurgencies in Iraq, Afghanistan, Lebanon and in Gaza, where it has provided military and financial support to the militant Islamic group Hamas, which now controls the Gaza Strip. While Mr. Mofaz did not threaten a military strike, Israeli officials said he told Ms. Rice that by the end of the year, Israel “would have to reassess where we are.”