Peak TV Is Over. A Different Hollywood Is Coming. – WSJ

Fewer new shows in production. A higher bar to get shows renewed. Rich paydays going only to an elite few.

The labor pact writers struck with studios and streamers this week, ending a five-month strike,  will likely accelerate the retrenchment that was already under way in Hollywood for more than a year. It represented a formal end to peak TV, a decade that included an explosion of programming for viewers and job opportunities for talent in Tinseltown.

Writers won major concessions in the deal, including new bonus payouts and higher royalties. Those hard-won victories are especially important given the hard financial realities of the entertainment business. 

A combination of debt-laden mergers, mounting losses in streaming, and the fast-shrinking cable TV bundle, has led to a push on Wall Street for entertainment companies to rein in spending. 

The streamers will have to find a way to pay increased talent costs from the writers settlement, along with an earlier deal with directors and whatever is finalized with actors without adding to their overall production costs.

via www.wsj.com

This is a sad, sad day. The cornucopia of bingeable TV is coming to an end, if cornucopias can do that. There are so many things to watch on TV you couldn’t possibly watch them all. I was once talking to a colleague about how productive my other colleague Gail was. “She told me she wants to get certain things done; she doesn’t have time to do anything else,” he said, more or less. “Well, that’s good,” I said. “What else is she supposed to do?”
“Well, for one thing, there’s a lot of TV to be watched.”

It’s true. I suffer from a different malady than productivity: A very short attention span. I want to watch all of Babylon 5 or the last season of GOT, but after 15 minutes I just can’t watch anymore. I also suffer from the knowledge that it is fictional anyway, and therefore just brainwashing of one kind or another. When I come across something really good, like Barkskins, I can log the requisite hours pretty well. Also I can watch 1 hour of British mystery every night, which is pretty good. I do my part. I do try to bear in mind that cops in the UK cannot possibly be as clever, detail-oriented and hardworking as they are on TV. In the end, they are just bureaucrats, not with guns, but with the power to call for armed police if the malefactors do not immediately surrender and confess their crimes, as they often do. American TV cops have to frequently resort to their sidearms.

I have also yet to see the UK episode in which the lawyer for the suspected or accused makes any sort of meaningful objection during police interrogation. I suspect we are just watching Law and Order with better writing and acting.