Many UK-based writers, who are also members of the Writers Guild of America (WGA), feel stuck in limbo due to a gray area in strike rules. The WGA’s strike has resulted in writers’ campaigns on social media, with many British writers feeling guilty for continuing to work during the strike. The U.K. branches of struck companies like Disney or Netflix aren’t covered by WGA terms, so multi-national businesses that have grown their local productions in recent years have left many British writers who are also WGA members in a difficult position. They are being pressured to walk away from their projects.
The lack of clear information about potentially career-defining projects has left some WGGB and WGA members in the dark. Some writers feel frustrated about putting their livelihoods at risk for projects that aren’t going to benefit from the same protection as WGA-covered projects. Meanwhile, in the U.K., it is difficult to see unified industrial action for British writers because they’re not obligated to join the WGGB to work. Many observe that “if you had an obligatory-membership writers‘ body, no doubt we’d have greater success.”
The U.K. system is less lucrative for writers than the U.S., with an hour of terrestrial television paying roughly a minimum of £12,000 ($15,000) for an hour-long episode. The still-evolving writers’ room model in the U.K., shorter episode orders, and an authorial approach to writing make the one-man-band style of U.S. “White Lotus” showrunner Mike White very much the norm in Britain rather than the exception. However, the increasing common ground in the streaming age has drawn considerable empathy from Brits in regard to the WGA’s fight with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.
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