The Next Generation of Entertainers Is Fighting for Its Future
This story was published on May 5, 2023 and updated on July 14
For the first time in over 60 years, the unions that represent screenwriters and actors are simultaneously striking. On July 13, the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) joined the picket line, standing side-by-side with the Writer's Guild of America (WGA), which has been striking since May.
This is more than a headline. The strike doesn't just affect actors and entertainment writers — it affects everyone.
Until the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), a conglomerate of the industry's largest content producers and their subsidiaries, meets the WGA and SAG's demands or a compromise is struck, production on scripted television and films is completely paused. Actors and writers are not allowed to promote forthcoming projects — via press junkets, interviews, panels, and participation in premieres (looking at you, Barbie) — IRL or on social media.
If you even slightly enjoy television, theater, or movies, let alone if you're a member of the working class, the 2023 writers and actors strike impacts you.
It's worth pausing here to iterate that we're in complete support of both SAG and the WGA. Not only are their demands reasonable but they're part of the lifeblood of the entertainment industry, especially young writers and performers, who are shaping entertainment's next generation.
"It's an honor to be on the picket line," Lily Houghton, WGA member and TV/film writer, told Highsnobiety. "When I first got my WGA card, I was like, 'Oh my god, my golden ticket.' The fact that I'm considered a writer is insane to me. I don't take one day for granted.
"Writing can be such a solitary job but on the picket line, we're all in it together."
"This strike is us as writers actively fighting for presence and respect," said Dylan Guerra, a two-year WGA member. "We're trying to secure a real, living wage from these corporations that have a chokehold on our ability to create."
All 11,000 writers in the WGA and 160,000 actors in SAG are pushing to get the AMPTP to acquiesce to a litany of reasonable demands, ranging from big picture asks like fair wages to more specific solicitations.
For example, "One of the reasons we're striking, which is really important to writers at my level, is to expand writer's rooms," Guerra explained. "We want to ensure that writer's rooms are larger and encompass more people of various levels. Studios push for mini-rooms, especially for things like limited series, which means fewer writers.
"This strike has major implications for younger writers, writers of color, queer writers. The hole in the funnel is tiny and it's only getting smaller. "
"My life [as a TV writer] probably sounds glamorous from the outside but inside it's quite different," Houghton continued. "I transitioned to TV [from writing for theater] and quickly realized how unsustainable it is. It's unsustainable even for successful writers because we aren't all protected or paid fairly. This is not a stable career.
"Studios are obsessed with making writers work in a kind of gig economy."
Remember that writers and actors aren't being paid for the duration of the strike, while entertainment executives continue to enjoy their nine-figure salaries.
"It's not even that shows are bringing in less money but that the money is going elsewhere," Guerra said.
What happens in Hollywood, one of the few cities in America where the labor force is heavily unionized, will have far-reaching implications not just for writers of all stripes but American laborers in general. A paltry six percent of America's workforce is unionized, according to the White House — if this can happen to collectivist Hollywood writers, it can happen anywhere.
Organized workers, like these writers and America's railroad operators, are one of the last major bulwarks in between the working class and corporate greed.
All writers and performers could theoretically use the any gains WGA and SAG members make in corporate negotiations as leverage for improving their own working conditions — for the good of us all, these professionals deserve to have their demands met.
Houghton clarified that non-WGA and SAG members are welcome to join the picket lines. "Even just amplifying the message on social media helps," she said.
"Right now, going to the picket line is my job. Fighting for equity is my job," Guerra said. "Right now, we can't do what we love because we're fighting for something greater than any one of us."
