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More than four months after “Real Time with Bill Maher” was canceled, the HBO show’s host said he would bring the series back despite the ongoing Hollywood writers’ strike, becoming the first late-night show star to do so announced his return. The Writers Guild of America responded to his announcement by promising to demo his show.
“Unfortunately, real time is coming back, without authors or without writing,” Maher wrote on Problems and Worries.”
According to HBO, the show is set to return on September 22nd.
Maher’s announcement comes the same week that Drew Barrymore said she would bring back her daytime talk show, prompting writers to demonstrate outside her taping in New York this week and criticize her for crossing strike lines.
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Since the strike began more than 130 days ago, some of the most notable actors and media personalities have steadfastly supported writers’ efforts to prevent studios from using their scripts to train AI systems and to establish an audience-based residual system for streaming shows. among other things.
Five major late-night talk hosts — Jimmy Fallon, Seth Meyers, Stephen Colbert, John Oliver and Jimmy Kimmel — have kept their shows dark while producing a regular podcast called “Strike Force Five” that they say makes money for their employees .
But Maher’s decision, following Barrymore’s, may show that support is beginning to wane, leading some to wonder whether others might follow suit.
The WGA called the move “disappointing.”
“If he implements his plan, he must honor more than just the ‘Spirit of the Strike,'” the group wrote on X. As a WGA member, the group added, Maher “cannot provide writing services.”
Maher said the show’s staff would not put together a monologue, a desk piece, his popular segment “New Rules” or an editorial. They all rely on writers who would break the strike to produce content for these segments. He also said that as one of the series’ writers, he would not be writing any lyrics.
Instead, Maher said, the show will feature “off-the-cuff” conversations, but acknowledged that the arrangement won’t be “as good as our normal show, period.”
Maher has been criticized by numerous writers on social media, including Keith Olbermann.
“Without writers, SCAB’s new weekly edition of ‘Real Time With @billmaher’ will be 83 seconds long,” wrote Olbermann, a longtime writer Political and sports commentator.
Maher said in his statement that he had hoped the strike would end before Labor Day, but “still nothing appears to be happening.”
Talks between WGA and the group that represents major studios and streaming services have failed. On Wednesday, thousands of striking writers and actors took to the streets of Hollywood to pressure studios to end the months-long strike that has financially hurt some writers and the staff who work with them.
Hollywood writers are demanding higher wages, assurances about how many writers will be hired per show and a larger share of residuals.
Maher previously faced backlash over his comments about the strike after he said some of the demands were unlikely to succeed. “They somehow believe that being a writer is how you make a living – and that’s not the case,” Maher said on his Club Random podcast, adding that there is an acceptable middle ground between what the strikers want and what they want should give studios suggest.
“You’re either for the strike … or you’re with Trump,” Maher said. “There are only two camps.”
If the strikes continue into October, studios will likely not offer new content for the fall for the first time in TV history.
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