Chris Keyser, co-chair of the WGA’s negotiating committee.
Matthew Belloni May 26, 2023

Hollywood’s Writers-Strike Force Majeure Fantasy

The longer the work stoppage goes on, the more fears spread about studios cutting unproductive writer-producer deals, wiping the fiscal slate clean, and ushering in a new era of austerity. But how much of that will actually happen?



Fran Drescher, president of SAG-AFTRA.
Jonathan Handel May 22, 2023
News, notes, and fresh reporting on a multi-front evolving legal situation.
Disney C.F.O. Christine McCarthy and C.E.O. Bob Iger and have told everyone for months that the content purge was coming, part of their increasingly frantic effort to erase $3 billion from the bottom line this year.
Matthew Belloni May 21, 2023
What’s going on at Disney is kind of nuts. If you told me that each of the Seven Dwarfs holding up the executive building in Burbank were being auctioned off to increase free cash flow, I’d probably believe it. Nearly every division has been asked to spend less, some way less. And titles are disappearing from Disney+ and Hulu as an entire industry retrenches.
2015 Ted Sarandos would have cringed at the sight of 2023 Sarandos suggesting from the stage that Netflix host “a 30 minute commercial” that “plays out over several days.”
Matthew Belloni May 19, 2023
An honest assessment of the P.R. spin, wishful thinking and outright obfuscation in a slimmed-down, mostly star-free ad pitch week.