Writers Used YouTube To Drum Up Support
Writer’s Guild members used their strike time creatively—to drum up public sympathy, their chief negotiator says.
Writers Guild of America-West President Patric Verrone, chief negotiator for 10,500 TV and film writers during the three-month strike, is an Emmy-winning producer-writer for the animated series Futurama.
He’s also a member of the California and Florida bars.
Verrone helped negotiate a new three-year contract giving writers a cut of revenue when shows or films they write are used on the Internet. The WGA also gets access to studio financial records to check revenue. Members voted overwhelmingly Tuesday to accept the contract, while the full membership will vote on the pact by mail or at membership meetings held Feb. 25.
“I think our situation resonated with middle-class Americans who realized most Hollywood writers aren’t rich,” says Verrone, who has no labor law experience. “We face some of the same issues as other workers, like employers outsourcing to avoid paying overtime or benefits.”
In December, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers hired California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s campaign manager and consultants Mark Fabiani and Chris Lehane, who earned the nickname “Masters of Disaster” for their effective handling of President Bill Clinton’s troubles when Monica Lewinsky was in the headlines.
“Our members felt panic when they heard the studios hired this team,” Verrone says. “But we had talented out-of-work writers with time on their hands to do YouTube videos to get the message out.”
Colbert Report writers crafted a YouTube bit showing cuddly animals refusing to be adorable on-camera to honor the strike. In another YouTube video, Christina Applegate plays a striker’s wife who desperately wants her husband at work because he’s driving her nuts. When she accidentally backs the car over his foot, she calls, “Walk it off!” and speeds away.
A third YouTube video shows WGA strike “enforcers” invading a coffee shop full of aspiring writers.
The upcoming April issue of the ABA Journal will run a longer profile of Verrone.
