WGA’s Patric Verrone: Resolve Of Writers Is Stronger Than During 2007/08 Strike

deadline.com:

Patric Verrone knows a thing or two about negotiations between the writers and studios. As President of the WGA West between 2005-2009, he was in charge during the last writers strike in 2007 and 2008.

He tells Deadline that the resolve of membership is “even stronger” than last time out. “I think the biggest similarity [with 07/08] is that the studios weren’t convinced that we were going to strike and I think they are similarly now wondering how long we’re gonna last.

The resolve of the membership then and now, however, is even stronger,” he said. Verrone said last night’s WGA meeting highlighted this. “I’ve been in this membership for 37 years.

I was President during the last strike. I’ve never seen the kind of outpouring of support from the Hollywood labor movement as we saw last night,” he said. “More than anything what makes the nature of a union fulfilling is the solidarity and the community and the ability to accomplish things through unity and so when you go beyond your own four walls, it becomes clear that we’re all in this together, which was the catchphrase of 2007, and that is even more true.” The Futurama writer said that the AMPTP wouldn’t address its main issues. “They treated [our issues] as if it was just business as usual and it’s not business as usual because the business is broken, and they broke it.” Next up for talks is the DGA, which in 2007/08 struck a deal while the writers were still on strike. “They had a lot of the same issues in that strike, fundamentally the same issue jurisdiction over the internet, and so it had a greater impact on the deal that resulted.