Too Much TV: Your TV Talking Points For Wednesday, August 2nd, 2023

The role of senior showrunners in strike negotiations

Here's everything you need to know about the world of television for Wednesday, August 2nd, 2023. 

THE ROLE OF TOP SHOWRUNNERS IN STRIKE NEGOTATIONS
There has been a lot of reporting today about the meeting this Friday between the studios (represented by AMPTP) and the striking writers (represented by the WGA). A lot of the news pieces describe the meeting as a "restart of negotiations," although the statement the WGA released last night very carefully didn't describe it that way. It's a meeting. But everyone I've spoken with today says there is no guarantee further negotiations would start-up anytime soon.

There seems to be a handful of likely scenarios that may play out on Friday:

1) AMPTP puts out some proposals and while they aren't where the WGA negotiators want to end up, the proposals show movement and both sides decide that it makes sense to keep talking.

2) Both sides lay out where they are at on the main sources of contention, and they both walk away.

3) The talks don't continue, but the meeting only really happened so that AMPTP could point to the WGA negotiators and say "See, WE tried to negotiate in good faith and these extremists aren't willing to compromise!"

4) Or pretty much the exact same scenario, expect in this case, it’s the WGA arguing AMPTP isn’t willing to compromise.

But there's another option percolating out there and this paragraph from a piece in today's NY Times offers a hint of that wrinkle:

Studios decided there could be a path forward with the Writers Guild after a small, informal meeting at a home in Los Angeles last Wednesday, the studio chairs said. A handful of executives met with three members of the guild’s negotiating committee, with senior showrunners helping to arrange the sit-down through back channels.

Those so-called "senior showrunners" are one of the big wild cards in these negotiations. They aren't directly impacted by a lot of the issues that even newer showrunners see as core to the discussions. And they have a number of financial incentives to see the disputes settled as quickly as possible. They also have an out-sized influence on both sides. Their influence on the WGA side is pretty easy to figure. But they also have influence on the studio side because they have generally been in the business for awhile and have established relationships with top executives. Also, there is nothing executives respect more than someone who can reliably make the studio money. And you don't get to the senior showrunner level without both reliably successful and also not a rabble-rouser.

When you talk to people on either side of the negotiations, it's pretty clear who at least some of these senior showrunners might be. They aren't the ones who are openly antagonistic to the WGA (Tyler Perry) or the ones who passively-aggressively walk right up to the line of breaking the strike lines (Ryan Murphy). But they are names you would easily recognize and one way to suss out some of their identities is to watch what's happened during the strike. Which top-line showrunners haven't been regularly walking the pickets lines or even offering public pronouncements of support for the strike? Ding, ding, ding. 

There are so many rumors floating around right now and the truth is that I don't think even the people headed for the meeting on Friday know what is going to happen. Or at least, they aren't sure enough to feel comfortable until it's over. 

One continuing rumor is that Netflix is somehow interested in cutting its own deal with both unions. And depending on the terms, that would not only give the streamer the leverage of getting back to work sooner, it could force the other AMPTP members into signing a similar deal that's structured in a way that gives Netflix a competitive advantage. In fact, that's a scenario I wrote about a couple of weeks ago.

The problem for me with that scenario is that in order to make both unions happy, Netflix would have to make significant changes to their production processes. Changes which would have a sizeable impact on the streamer's bottom line. OTOH, there could be a calculation at the company that it can afford the hit at the bottom line, while the changes might force at least one or more competing SVODs to significantly scale back or even shut down entirely.

ODDS AND SODS
* The conservative SVOD Fox Nation is adding three shows produced by the Fox Corp.-owned Outkick Media. OutKick The Show With Clay Travis and Tomi Lahren Is Fearless are nightly political talk shows. Gaines For Girls is a weekly show hosted by 12-time All-American swimmer Riley Gaines. That show discusses "protecting the legal rights women have achieved in athletics," including the dangers of transgenders athletes.

* The Hollywood strikes are tough on a lot of industries. Buy maybe not so much on that mushy category of "creators," who are suddenly a lot more important to studios.

* Jeffrey Goldberg, the editor in chief of The Atlantic, will be the new moderator of the long-running PBS Friday night roundtable show Washington Week, which will be retitled Washington Week with The Atlantic.

TWEET OF THE DAY

I'VE ALWAYS FOUND THIS TO BE A WEIRD CRITICISM OF NETFLIX
The John Cena/Jackie Chan movie Hidden Strike topped weekly Top 10 overall charts by a wide margin this week with 22 million views through July 30th. Which prompted another round of dunking by critics of the streamer, who mocked the fact that a five-year-old theatrical release was currently the most-watched film on Netflix.

But I'd argue just the opposite is true, both from a financial as well as a creative standpoint. Hidden Strike can only be considered a "theatrical release" under the loosest possible definition. While the film cost as estimated an $80 million to produce, the movie’s name changed six times and it generated a paltry $1.7 million in a limited theatrical run in Asia.

So the sale of the film to Netflix is really a win for everyone. I have no idea what Netflix paid to license the film, but generally these deals are based on box office results. I suspect they paid a premium given the stars, but the streamer still likely got the movie for a steal, relatively speaking. And the film's producers were able to recoup at least some of their losses.

It's also a positive for Netflix subscribers. They have the chance to see a movie starring a couple of recognizable names in a relatively recent film that they likely had never heard of until it popped up in their que. 

I suppose the dunking is supposed to show that a licensed film is currently out-performing some Netflix original films. Which is true, but in this case, that doesn't really matter. If it's a new film to most viewers, it is essentially a "Netflix" film to them.

ROKU WANTS TO COORDINATE YOUR FOOD DELIVERY WITH THE END OF THE SHOW YOU'RE WATCHING
Because I am a little weird, I enjoy wading through patent applications from media companies. It's extremely dry reading, but it also provides you with some hints about where the company is headed strategically. 

This recent patent from Roku might have the dry title of "Coordinated Processing of Food Ordering Based on Media Content Presentation," but the premise is pretty cool. 

There are a lot of moving parts, but the patent points to an idea in which a user could be watching a TV show and would be able to bring up a prompt to order food while the program is paused. The food delivery could also be timed to the content being watched. For instance, if there is an hour left in the movie you're watching, the function would search for nearby restaurants that could deliver timed to just after the end of the film.

WHAT'S NEW TODAY AND TOMORROW:

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 2ND:
* Big Brother 25 Season Premiere (CBS)
* Does Murder Sleep? Series Premiere (Investigation Discovery)
* Head To Head (Netflix)
* Hijack Season Finale (Apple TV+) 
* Iconic America: Our Symbols And Stories With David Rubenstein Series Finale (PBS)
* Mark Cavendish: Never Enough (Netflix)
* Physical Season Three Premiere (Apple TV+)
* Poisoned: The Dirty Truth About Your Food (Netflix)
* Reservation Dogs Season Three Premiere (FX)
* Soulcatcher (Netflix)
* Star Wars: Young Jedi Adventures (Disney+)

THURSDAY, AUGUST 3RD, 2023:
* Botched Season Premiere (E!)
* Choona (Netflix)
* Demons & Saviors (Hulu)
* Fboy Island Series Premiere (The CW)
* Happily Married Season Two Premiere (Topic)
* Heartstopper (Netflix)
* Jersey Shore Family Vacation Season Premiere (MTV)
* Secrets Of A University (LMN)
* The Lincoln Lawyer Season Two Premiere (Netflix)
* Wrongly Accused (Sundance Now)
* Zom 100: Bucket List Of The Dead (Netflix) 

Click Here to see the list of all of the upcoming premiere dates for the next few months.

SEE YOU WEDNESDAY!

If you have any feedback, send it along to Rick@AllYourScreens.com and follow me on Twitter @aysrick.