On-location production of scripted TV series has ground to a complete halt in Los Angeles due to the five-week-old Writers Guild strike, according to data compiled by FilmLA, the city and county film permit office.
“In a normal week at this time of year, there would be dozens of scripted television projects in production. By contrast, we have no scripted TV series with permits to film this week,” said FilmLA spokesman Philip Sokoloski.
Last week, only one scripted TV show had pulled a permit to film on-location here; the week before there were five; the week before that there were seven, and in the first week of the strike there were nine, although many of those shows had ceased production because of the strike.
Overall, the number of location permits taken out by film and TV projects was down 62.8% – to 128 for the week ending June 4 compared to 344 for the same period a year ago. “These are the categories into which all scripted projects fall, though not all production within these categories is affected by the labor action,” Sokoloski said. “Reality TV, as one example, still appears in these counts in addition to non-union independent films.”
The WGA launched its strike May 2 after negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers failed to reach a satisfactory agreement. The guild’s core issues include significant increases in compensation, minimum staffing, duration of employment, the establishment of viewer-based streaming residuals and curbs on the use of artificial intelligence to create scripts.
SAG-AFTRA began negotiations with the AMPTP for its own contract this morning, and members of the Directors Guild are currently in the process of ratifying a new contract that was reached on June 4.