The Best Entertainment Era

In the reception room of the Relativity Building, Ronan shook hands with a gray-haired middle-aged white man.

Hello, Mr. Anderson. The middle-aged white man smiled enthusiastically: It's very nice to see you again.

With the demeanor of a master, Ronan said with a smile: Bill, welcome to Relativity Entertainment.

This middle-aged man is the chairman of the American Western Screenwriters Guild, and his name is Bill Domingo. He is also a senior screenwriter in Hollywood, but he was active in the 1970s and 1980s. Although there are many works, he is less famous , which belong to the category with large output but lack of high-quality goods.

In the mid-1990s, Bill Domingo stopped writing scripts and turned to administrative work in the Western Screenwriters Guild. In 2005, he became the chairman of the Western Screenwriters Guild Council.

The Writers Guild of America is a large general organization, which consists of two parts: the West Writers Guild and the East Writers Guild.

As the name suggests, its members are mainly divided by geographical location.

The Screenwriters Union is a very large organization, even with relatively high entry requirements, it has nearly 20,000 members.

There is no doubt that Bill Domingo is the spokesperson for the interests of these people.

Bill Domingo exchanged a few words with Ronan and went straight to the point: Mr. Anderson, the situation in Hollywood is not very good recently, and the entire industry may be in turmoil. No one wants to see this situation. This time I am On behalf of the Screenwriters Guild...

Ronan understood what he meant, and said, Bill, you should talk to Del Potro about this matter. He is the chairman of the Producers Union and is responsible for specific matters.

Bill Domingo is very clear that if he wants to resolve this matter as soon as possible, he cannot avoid it: I have talked with Del many times, and the two sides have great differences. If we continue to talk through formal channels, we may not be able to reach an agreement in a few months. protocol.

Ronan roughly guessed that the Producers Union contacted several major labor unions in private, and adopted a method of division and disintegration to deal with the Hollywood union alliance. company.

Although the Producers Alliance is composed of more than 80 companies, if they can persuade large and medium-sized companies among them, the rest will not be a problem.

Even if you can persuade some of the large and medium-sized companies, the situation will become very favorable for the screenwriters union.

That being said, the job is not difficult at all.

Ronan looked very calm and said, It's useless for you to talk to me about this matter. To tell you the truth, Bill. The producers' union has already reached an agreement, and the negotiations with the union will be conducted by the union.

Bill Domingo smiled, but he didn't have any intention of giving up, and said: I have carefully counted, in the past three years, among all the companies in Hollywood, the company that produces the most movies and drama projects is your theory of relativity. Entertainment. Now and for years to come, if I'm not mistaken?

There is no need to deny this kind of thing. If you don’t count the film library and past copyright income, and just talk about the new film projects every year, Relativity Entertainment is currently the company with the largest business volume and the highest income in Hollywood.

Ronan said casually: It is estimated that in a short period of time, no company will surpass Relativity Entertainment in terms of newly started projects.

Relativity Entertainment has the most projects and employs the largest number of screenwriters. Bill Domingo is still trying his best: Once this incident is delayed for too long, if it gets worse, Relativity Entertainment will suffer the greatest loss.

Ronan remained calm: Bill, what do you mean...

Bill Domingo said: If Relativity Entertainment can reach an agreement with the Writers Guild,

All screenwriters under the union can cooperate normally with Relativity Entertainment, and will not have any impact on Relativity Entertainment.

Ronan couldn't help laughing: This will bring about a split in the producers' union.

You are a loose alliance, and you have the power to negotiate with the union. Bill Domingo said the truth: I believe that other companies will not consider your alliance in the face of favorable conditions.

Ronan nodded slightly: You are right.

The producer union is an alliance of interests. The reason why they treat the trade union union in unison for the time being is because they share common interests in this regard.

There is nothing wrong with ditching the union and negotiating with unions when more favorable terms arise.

Bill Domingo added: The union takes its partnership with Relativity Entertainment very seriously, as well as...

Ronan raised his hand to consider Bill Domingo's words: I understand what you mean. Relativity Entertainment doesn't want to see the conflict between the alliance and the union completely intensify and develop to an irreversible point.

That sounded good, but Bill Domingo knew there might be a twist later.

Sure enough, Ronan's voice changed: But the new conditions you put forward, Relativity Entertainment cannot accept anyway.

We can talk, Bill Domingo said.

As long as the two sides officially start talks, there is no doubt that a signal will be released.

Your conditions are too high. Ronan didn't mean to refuse to negotiate, but if he wanted to negotiate, the conditions must be lowered: 15% new media and DVD revenue share, and other aspects of the share increased to 100% Third, it also requires additional compensation from new channels in the past, which cannot be negotiated.”

Bill Domingo asked, What about the terms of Relativity entertainment?

Ronan said directly: I won't talk about the minimum income and maximum income of union members. The main thing is the share. In terms of traditional channels, free TV, pay movies, and cable TV, the share of 1% of the distributor's global revenue remains unchanged. DVDs can be added to the home entertainment share, for example, the same as videotapes, 1.5% of the producer's revenue. In addition, each movie will also pay the screenwriter a total of $10,000 in DVD script fees.

Bill Domingo's face remained unchanged, but his heart was cold. This low condition is unacceptable!

Internet new media... Ronan pondered for a while, and said, It can also be discussed, one percent of the publisher's revenue.

Bill Domingo fell into a brief silence.

Compared with the requirements of the screenwriters union, the conditions offered by Ronan fell directly from the sky into the Mariana Trench.

In the past, the sharing items are good. There are basically no major changes, and there are no major problems. The revenue from video tapes is now better than nothing. The 1% distribution revenue sharing of TV channels can be discussed later, and it will increase a little bit.

But in terms of DVD and new media channels, the bargaining is too hard.

The screenwriters’ union has never thought about peripheral derivatives channels, and they don’t get the support of the labor union in this regard. However, in terms of copyright income that screenwriters can participate in, the highest income is DVD and Internet new media led by Netflix. .

The Writers Guild is demanding a 15 percent share of the gross proceeds.

In terms of new media and DVD, Ronan cut 0.5% and 1.5% respectively, not to mention the total revenue share.

The former is the publisher's revenue share, and the latter is the producer's revenue share.

Copyright income can be generally divided into three parts, namely channels, distributors and producers. How much will it be reduced if the two aspects are excluded and only the income of one aspect is calculated?

With all due respect. Bill Domingo said, The writers union cannot accept such a condition.

Ronan spread his hands: Then we don't need to negotiate in private.

If there is not enough interest, why does Relativity Entertainment take the risk of offending the producers union and negotiate with the screenwriters union alone?

Bill Domingo is still trying his best to fight for it: Mr. Anderson, you also worked as a screenwriter in the first place, and you understand the hardships of this line of work. How many screenwriters have worked hard, but have not been rewarded accordingly? Is this fair?

To be precise, screenwriters are treated unfairly in Hollywood. Ronan knows this, but he can't stand on the screenwriter's side, even if he has been a screenwriter before: Sorry, Bill, I'm a producer, and I have to work for Thousands of Relativity Entertainment employees are responsible.

The differences between the Producers Union and the major trade unions have nothing to do with fairness or justice.

The meeting between the two parties did not reach any agreement in the end, and the differences were not generally large.

At the end of October, the producer union's division and disintegration strategy played a role, and successively reached new agreements with the directors' union and the actors' union. In existence, most of the trade unions have died down, and the only big trade union organizations that are still fighting against the producers' union are the screenwriters' union.

The Directors' Union and Screen Actors' Union, as well as their respective members, still vocally support the Screenwriters' Union, but this kind of verbal support is basically equivalent to zero.

After the Producers Union made some appropriate compromises, the two unions abandoned the screenwriters union again as they did two decades ago.

The Producers Union cannot accept the new agreement proposed by the Screenwriters Union.

To put it simply, this new agreement involves a series of issues such as hiring, firing, treating, compensating screenwriters and how to sign screenwriters.

Among them, financial clauses are one of the focuses of negotiations between the two parties, mainly including two aspects: on the one hand, it is stipulated that film and TV producers must pay screenwriters a salary higher than a certain minimum wage; on the other hand, it is stipulated that TV programs or For the omni-channel income earned by film copyrights, screenwriters must increase the share of accounts.

There are also good reasons for the screenwriters’ union. The entertainment industry is now the most profitable time. In the latest fiscal year, the eight entertainment media companies in Hollywood, including Relativity Entertainment DreamWorks, which dominate the film and TV market, had an operating profit of nearly 56 billion U.S. dollars. , More than 80% of the screenwriters of the screenwriters union work in these eight companies.

While the combined profits of these eight companies have doubled in the past decade and continue to grow, the writers union believes that the entertainment industry thrives on the content created by union members, which drives the global growth of entertainment media companies and online video. The meteoric rise of distribution, and the companies that control the content, have profited many times over, and screenwriters deserve a share of this unprecedented boom.