The scene at Disney in Burbank on Friday, the 144th day of the Writers Guild strike.
Lesley Goldberg/Staff
Warner Bros. Discovery boss David Zaslav now admits that striking writers were right to call for sweeping changes to how Hollywood creators are paid.
Zaslav told The New York Times in a lengthy new profile that he has no regrets about the Sept. 24 deal struck between the studios and the Writers Guild of America for a new three-year contract.
“You’re right about almost everything,” Zaslav said. “What if we pay too much? I have never regretted overpaying for great talent or great asset.”
As part of the deal, the writers received a salary increase, minimum show staff requirements and protection from AI, among other things. But studios resisted writers’ demands for months, leading to a strike that lasted a brutal 148 days and nearly brought the industry to a standstill. In July, Disney CEO Bob Iger called the writers’ proposed compensation changes “unrealistic.”
Zaslav’s suggestion that writers may now be overpaid will likely strike some critics as ironic, considering the executive famously received $246 million in compensation in 2021. WGA board member Adam Conover previously responded, “That’s about the same amount that 10,000 writers are asking of him. “All of us, all right?” For further context: If you consider the contracts of the Writers Guild, SAG-AFTRA and the Directors Guild combined, total costs are “closer to the upper end of our annual cost estimate of $450 million to $600 million,” Moody’s Investor Service said Nov. 10.
The Times profile points out that WBD ultimately saved a lot of money as a result of the writers’ and actors’ strikes, but that Zaslav, despite his extremely aggressive and controversial cost-cutting, was slow to greenlight new projects that could improve the company’s bottom line . Despite $3 billion in cuts, the company lost $400 million in the third quarter. The board’s trust in the executive remains strong, the story goes.
The story follows Warners’ latest self-inflicted headache: the announced cancellation and cancellation of another film, Coyote Vs. Acme – a live-action and animation hybrid that briefly seemed doomed to suffer the same fate as Batgirl and Scoob ! from last year! Holiday Haunt, which were dumped for tax write-offs. After outcry from the creative community, the company has since changed course and plans to sell the film to studios and streamers, although one congressman, Texas Rep. Joaquin Castro, is now calling for the studio to be investigated for “predatory and anti-competitive” practices .