WGA meets again with AMPTP Friday as writers strike continues

After more than 100 days of strikes, the Writers Guild of America said it had agreed to meet again with negotiators from major Hollywood studios on Friday.

In a note to members Thursday morning, the guild said Carol Lombardini, president of the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, had requested a meeting with the union’s bargaining committee.

This would be the second meeting since the writers’ strike that began in May. Officials from the WGA and the Studio Alliance met last week with the aim of resuming talks, but people familiar with the matter said the meeting did not go well.

The AMPTP represents studio owners such as Walt Disney Co. and Netflix.

“We expect the AMPTP to respond to WGA proposals,” the WGA negotiating committee said in its note to members.

AMPTP declined to comment.

It’s unclear what will come out of Friday’s meeting, but the move comes as studio executives face mounting pressure to find a way out of the labor crisis that has caused widespread turmoil in the industry.

The two sides remain far apart on issues such as the WGA’s demands for a minimum staffing requirement in the TV authors’ rooms and protection against artificial intelligence. The pressure on the studios to remedy the work disruption is increasing, since the actors organized as part of SAG-AFTRA have also been on strike since mid-July.

“Our committee returns to the negotiating table ready to make a fair deal, knowing that the unified WGA membership stands behind us and backed by the continued support of our union allies,” the WGA negotiating committee said.

Friday’s meeting is a positive sign that the two sides are willing to listen to each other and understand that they are likely to make concessions, said David Smith, a professor of economics at Pepperdine University’s Graziadio Business School.

“Any time people are in the room and talking to each other, it presents the possibility of a resolution,” Smith said.