Awards shows threatened by Hollywood writers strike
Rob Woollard

LOS ANGELES—Hollywood’s writers strike is threatening to take the shine off the movie industry’s awards season, with stars wary at the prospect of having to cross picket lines before walking up the red carpet.
The prospect of a resolution to the six-week-old strike drifted further away this week, with the Writers Guild of America (WGA) on Thursday accusing studio negotiators of acting unlawfully by severing negotiations.
The latest breakdown between the two warring factions has left organisers of the movie industry’s biggest awards shows — the Golden Globes and the Oscars — nervously considering how the strike may affect their events.
The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has already contacted the WGA to request that the body issues a waiver for its Golden Globes show on January 13, allowing guild members to be hired to write the show’s script.
A waiver would also allow actors, writers and directors to attend the event without the embarrassing problem of crossing picket lines.
So far, the WGA has refused to speculate on whether it will grant the Globes’ organisers request.
WGA spokesman Gregg Mitchell told reporters it was “too early to tell” whether a waiver woud be issued. Mitchell told the Washington Post however that organisers would face a challenge “to make a high-quality, entertaining show without the writers who are members of the guild.”
David Cronenberg, the director of gangster drama “Eastern Promises”, which has been nominated for best picture at the Golden Globes, said he would be uncomfortable breaking ranks with writers.
“It would be very hard for me to cross a WGA picket line,” said Cronenberg, a longstanding member of the WGA. “Everybody will have the same problem,” he told Daily Variety.
Actress Glenn Close, who has been nominated for her performance in US television series “Damages”, added: “I would never cross a picket line.”
While Globes organisers grapple with the implications of the strike, Oscars organisers are also faced with a headache as the February 24 show looms closer, according to analysts.
Host Jon Stewart’s “Daily Show” has been off the air since the strike began, and guild writers are hired to provide the script for the Academy Awards.
However, Leslie Unger, director of communications for the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, told reporters it was too soon to tell how the strike may affect the show.
“We’re working on all of the planning and preparation activities that would normally be our focus at this time, and we’re planning to do our show on February 24,” Unger told reporters.
“It’s too soon to know how the strike, if still going, might impact us.”
Awards season watchers believe the strike could spell trouble for the Oscars.
“The big question is what are they going to do at the ceremony?” said Lew Harris of the movies.com website.
“Jon Stewart is not doing his show. Can he really host the Oscars without someone writing it? He can’t write because he’s on strike.”
Harris said if no resolution to the writers dispute is found before the Oscars, organisers may instead opt to do away with a script.
“The ceremony has gotten so boring anyway that it hardly makes any difference whether you have people writing a script,” he said.
Harris said he doubted however that attendees at the awards shows would be tempted to use their victory speeches to score political points in the dispute.
“I think it’s seen in poor taste to do that, to use your acceptance speech as a bully pulpit,” Harris told reporters.
“There might be a couple of jibes but I don’t think that it’s going to be angry in any way”.