Variety is reporting that Hollywood is having a bad case of the winter blues, now that the strike is over. There are significantly fewer TV pilots and budgets for current series are being cut back. Feature films are being put on hold in fear of a Screen Actor's Guild walkout. And the shifts in the TV and film schedules have meant either heavy workloads or prolonged unemployment. "The studios are punishing writers for going out," one partner at a major talent agency argued. "They want to take their pound of flesh, so they’re pushing back deals and not making new ones." A looming recession is also keeping producers, actors and writers on edge. Thunder Road producer Basil Iwanyk told Variety that the overall level of anxiety and stress around town is "very high," and that anyone who claims otherwise "is lying."  read more »

MONDAY

First, the good news: it looks like the strike may be coming to an end. Now, the bad news: even in the most hopeful scenario, new episodes of popular shows, like Grey’s Anatomy, won’t hit the airwaves until April or March, if at all before the fall. Jeff Zucker may have found a silver lining in all of this—at least publicly—but what does the rest of America have to show for it except for a newly acquired taste for reality programming?  read more »

As weeks turn into months, the Writers Guild of America’s strike is taking a toll on some editors and reporters at major newspapers and weekly magazines.  read more »

This time last year, it would have been difficult to fathom that as 2007 came to a rather inexorable end, there would be no new episodes of The Office or, hell, even Desperate Housewives to get us through what promises to be another long, cold, slushy New York winter; that Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert would be doing their shows on their own; and that in a world when one man, Rupert Murdoch, owns a scarily increasing percentage of the world’s media, a one-woman Web site would show that feisty journalistic independence isn’t  read more »

Over in Hollywood, while striking writers and studios remain at loggerheads, the agents, TV agents in particular, have discovered Facebook, the networking Web site, as a new and exciting way to keep the community spirit alive. “Every major studio, basically every major development executive, and I’m talking to the president level, is on Facebook,” said Dan Erlij of UTA.  read more »

Studio negotiators were stunned when the Writers Guild of America discussed unionizing reality shows and animation during this week's discussions. The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers had thought those topics were off the table, according to the Associated Press.

Variety is reporting that the union is now facing the prospect that the studios will grow impatient with the molasses movement of negotiations and make a "take-it-or-leave-it offer" as early as next week.

Variety reports:

Little progress emerged from Thursday's talks, with both sides meeting briefly in the morning, followed by WGA negotiators waiting most of the day for the companies' response in two key new-media areas -- Intenet downloads and jurisdiction.

Neither side issued a statement at the end of the day other than confirming that negotiations will resume in the ayem today for the fourth straight day. But time's starting to run out, partly due to the looming holiday season with Christmas and New Year's Day falling midweek and essentially wiping out any chance for the sides to meet for those two weeks -- should they still be negotiating.

The latest potential victim of the screenwriters strike?

TV critics!

"The TV Critics Association and the Cable Television Association for Marketing said that if the Writers Guild of America strike is not settled by Dec. 14, the winter press tour will be canceled," TV Week reported today.

"Usually held in January, the winter press tour is used by broadcast and cable networks to introduce mid-season shows to television writers at newspapers, magazines and other media."

Today, presidential candidate John Edwards spoke in Washington Square Park at a rally in support of striking television writers. A few weeks earlier, Mr. Edwards had popped in on the strike lines in Los Angeles.

"We're in this together," Mr. Edwards said, according to Variety.  read more »

There's little doubt as to who's the striking Hollywood writers' favorite journalist/blogger.  Via Cinematical.com: LA Weekly columnist Nikki Finke, who's been covering every angle of the stoppage, from a generally pro-writers perspective, has been given the exclusive right to publish the Guild's "Speechless" internet videos on her blog, Deadline Hollywood Daily.  The buzzy short productions feature stars like Sean Penn, Harvey Keitel, Tim Robbins, and Holly Hunter declaring their support for the writers. 

More than $20 million a day!

That is, according to one totally and completely not impartial observer!  read more »