I'm hearing all sorts of things that may happen at the Writers Guild meeting tomorrow night. Yes, I will be there. No, I won't be live-blogging from it and that's because I want to pay attention and also not violate the sanctity of what obviously will be an important gathering. Rumors abound about what's in the offer that will be discussed and I'm trying to not formulate an opinion until I actually know what I'm formulating an opinion about. I think it's fair to say though that the offer will be good enough for some and not good enough for others.
I will pass along one rumor, though. It's that the current proposal is for a deal that would expire in May of 2011. That sounds odd to me because the Screen Actors Guild traditionally makes contracts that expire at the end of July and if they make a new three year deal without a strike, that one would probably expire in July of '11 and the AMPTP could again be in the position of facing both unions with linked arms. One of the Big Stories of this Writers Strike, and the reason it's been so effective, has been the unbreakable solidarity with SAG. I don't know why the studios would risk having that happen again. Perhaps they think they can move SAG's expiration month to December.
The above, I should underscore, may not be true. None of the rumors may be true, including the one that has all the lawyers on both sides still scurrying to commit to paper some terms that can be discussed tomorrow evening. About the only thing I'll predict for sure about the meeting is that there will be a lot of arguing and that the parking at the Shrine Auditorium is going to suck. If you're getting there, get there early.