To read the Hollywood trades, we in the Writers Guild are somehow simultaneously aristocrats and agitators, overpaid radical dandies. One thinks of Dalton Trumbo jawing about Marx as he swills cocktails by the pool.
The reality is less romantic. I schlep my kids to public school in a Subaru full of loose Legos and half-crushed Goldfish crackers, then spend the rest of my day in a constant hustle, inventing and pitching in and out of writers’ rooms and producers’ offices. I love my job and I’m lucky to have it. But even after five years, writing on great shows and making work of which I’m proud, I have to worry about every paycheck. And my story is typical.
Yup, poor little writer
But the alternative was even scarier: the permanent end of the middle-class Hollywood writer.
Jeebus.
Their old contract gave them $60,000 minimum for a 30 minute script or $5,000 a week for working as part of a team.
Middle class…..kiss my hairy arse.
Needs to keep his car clean too!
I love my job and I’m lucky to have it.
Right, so shut up then.
I think the problem is that they compare themselves against really capable and senior professionals, and wonder why they aren’t paid the same.
They are setting their comparison way too high.
It’s LEGO !!!!!
It’s a ******ing mass noun. Do you drink milks? and rices? and cook it in waters?
Right there, right in his second breath is prime reason let him throw his teddy out of his pram and let him strop off and not come back.
To quote quite possibly the best radio play ever broadcast…
VROOMFONDEL: We demand that that machine not be allowed to think about this problem!
DEEP THOUGHT: If I might make an observation…
MAJIKTHISE: We’ll go on strike!
VROOMFONDEL: That’s right. You’ll have a national philosophers and luminaries strike on your hands.
DEEP THOUGHT: And who will that inconvenience?
MAJIKTHISE: Never you mind who it’ll inconvenience you box of black legging binary bits! It’ll hurt, buster! It’ll hurt!
$5,0000 a week!!
Jesus, that’s more than a snake oil salesman could con out of the Joseph Rowntree Foundation for not having a full-time job writing a blog.