Hello the Internet, and welcome to season three hundred episodes. One of the guys, this is Sparta and this is a production of by Heart Radio. That was the first, other than when we mentioned it last week, the first time it has crossed my mind that this is season three hundred, so of course PARTA. Yeah, we're gonna have special stuff planned.
Jack.
This should be the most four episodes. This should be the most significant season because three hundred is like the genesis point of everything.
I think, Yeah, it's like our favorite movie.
We saw each other in line for the movie three hundred shirtless.
I remember whiling up.
You greased my back. I remember that's how I like, hey, bro, you might get my back a little bit. And then he told me my push up for hum was off, and then I went to the bathroom sobbing. But then you came back and he said, hey, buddy, I didn't mean to say it like that.
You look great.
You look great, man.
We should really try and hit a ninety degree angle if you're going all the way down, because I was doing a real shallow like.
But then I told you about NAGT and how you know how I know full that was and how you could use it to control the world.
And you looked so cool with that boa like feather boa around your neck like with test now, dude. And then at the time I remember you introduced me or you you introduced yourself to me as cryptic. You're like, hey, I'm cryptic, and I was like, whoa what likerypt.
Is so good?
Oh shit, it's Tuesday, August fifteenth, twenty twenty three.
Yeah, National Relaxation Day, National Leathercraft Day, National Lemon Merane High Day, and v J Day and something about.
The war ending. Cool. There you go.
Cool. My name is Jack O'Brien AKA get your Ship, get your whole ship bit. Hey, hey, get my ship, get my whole shit bit. That is courtesy of Christy Amagucci Man too too Legit to quit.
There were like four words.
In that AK and I forgot them for the first half, but that's all right. Thank you for the AKA. Great to see again, Christy. I'm thrilled to be joined as always by my co host mister Miles.
Brad, Mister Miles Gray, AK, Crispy One Time Rolls filled with avocado, chicken Too may Do and Mona Ray jack Apple what Smoke Chris Bacon with housemad Ranchiito.
I love these egg rolls. I get them each time.
And obviously that's rich CPK. We're bringing it back obviously right to post under the bridge. Talking about Jack evokes CPK, and we had to bring up RHCPK again, So thank you, thank you.
It hits different once, once you've had a long running bit about RHCPK, going to CPK. HiT's a little different, does it.
Yeah? It good feels good to have heartburn in a place like this.
Well, miles, we are thrilled to be joined in our third seats by one of the very phases, one more hilarious and brilliant producer, TV writer. You know him from the Yos This racist podcast.
It's Andrew Solidary Team.
Hey, Solidarity welcome.
I'm having trouble with some of the Union songs, man, it's it's a little the Union song canon got a little white. And then briefly I was like playing like Communist Party Chinese music on my hype up to the picket line. A little weird, A lot of a lot of killing motherfuckers in those songs.
You didn't you sing like Bella Chow, you know, there's like that one, good old, good old yarn from the Italians anthem.
You know what, Yeah, there's there's a probably there's a bunch of that. You know. Then there's probably a bunch of stuff in Spanish that is that's my fault that I went to Chinese communist.
Let you know first, you know, everybody out there singing Richmond north of Richmond.
Yeah, it's it's not it's the that was more of a beginning of the strike thing. I think that was when we're all like try to like try to be serious, try. I think what it was was we're trying to impress the teamsters like we're cool, we're down, and now it's now it's just kind of at.
Your backs, just not picking up the signs.
Oh my god, it's really it's really it's been uh, it's been a good strike. I haven't seen you guys in a minute, but you know, strike it.
Yeah, I mean that's why we wanted to have you on because just there's it's constantly changing. And I think
also our understanding of the industry. I think especially for like people outside of California, for ship outside of LA have like a very like a perspective on what's happening, and it's not fully formed, and I think you know, to the purpose of today is to really like roll our sleeves up, give some perspective and talk about like what's at stake here truly, because we definitely got a good intro when Adam Connover came on, and now that like things are.
Slowly developing, we know a little bit more.
We kind of wanted to come back because this affects like eighty percent of our listener's favorite guests. Like most of y'all realize all the comedians that we have on, a lot of them spend time in writers' rooms because that's the they ain't. Like Marcella said, she's like, it ain't happen. You're not getting it from stand up. So I get while the homies end up going to write because that's a way to carve out a life for yourself.
So anyway, yeah, looking forward to talking. I get it.
You guys have eaten it California Pizza Kitchen. You think you understand what the strike is all about? Yeah?
Yeah, I mean you've had in and out one's right, you get it.
You got you now you've got a mc peek, right, you could bash those yeah.
Shuah amcp K yeah, yeah, I don't know.
We'll work on it, resounding that out just to make sure.
Comes in.
But oh oh hey yeah yeah that's tough. That's tougher, tough one. Uh a mrcpk. Yeah, it doesn't work. Doesn't need a bigger room. We need a bigger room to Yeah, you know, if we had, if we had enough enough minds to do this, yeah, we could come up with we give you the proper products. Sorry about that, that's right, exactly.
Well, Andrew, Before we get to all the strike stuff, we do like to get to know our guests a little bit better and ask you, what is something from your search history?
All right? This is this is uh gonna be I think this one was okay, and it didn't really give me the results I was looking for exactly, but I searched earlier this week? Is Splinter a weeb in the new TMNT movie? Because there are there are two ways you can go with classical depictions of Splinter. One is essentially like an actual Japanese rat or sometimes a Japanese
person and who's been ratified Ratituo weed. And then I believe the Newish depictions are he's just like a web essentially just a New Yorker who loves Japanese culture so much he decided he's not Hamato Yoshi anymore. I don't think he was named in the new in the current one, but no, here they are not like he's yeah, what's his accent? Like what's his voice?
Like?
Well, okay, so this is where it gets even weirder. So I did not realize what this was until I didn't really get a satisfactory answer, and I just went down that rabbit hole of sometimes he's a web but even weirder. And I guess I probably could have known this if I've paid more attention to the advertising. He's voiced by Jackie Chan and what like pretty clearly, so they split the difference. He's an Asian rat, but he's
still a web. How you do that? They basically are just like he just liked Ninja shit, like the way American you know, well meaning kind of racist drives like yeah, like Ninja shit. He's just like he's like, I don't know, we needed a way to learn how to fight, and Ninja's are cool.
So it's like kind of like Wu Tang adjacent like Theriza. Yeah, yeah, we're just watching Kong Fu movies like that's how it basically is exactly that. It's the same way Wu Tang got their whole ship. Yeah, like I don't know it, but it's like.
He's he is Asian. It's definitely not Japanese. Isn't no point played for Japanese. It's very like, I don't I'm choosing not to think it through too hard because.
I really like the movie right right, I haven't seen it, but I will be taking my.
Oh my dude, so many of my my friends are like, yo, you should go see it's it's not bad. Actually, because a few my friends are doing the millennial thing or like millennial parent were like, hey, I think my kids to see some shit I fucking know about, and they're like, yeah, I regret it, or that was the main threast.
It wasn't like it wasn't bad. I don't regret it. I'll throw this out there and maybe this is I'm childless but old, so I'm both a teenager and basically a dad. It is maybe my favorite movie. Sends everything everywhere all it once. Oh wow, so so good to me specifically, Wow, Okay, that's yo. That's a heavy fucking stamp of approval out here. I genuinely I walked out.
I was like, my I watched it with a group of fellow TV writers on strike because we were like, fuck it, we'll go after the picket lied in the middle of the day. My friend tourd to me like four minutes in. I was like, I think this is the most beautiful movie I've ever seen. Just one tear coming down.
It's like it's animation.
Yeah, yeah, animation. Yeah, the animation looks amazing. It's like perfectly like Dudes our Age New York kind of like like that kind of like slightly backpacker ReVibe plus real teenage ship plus real like dad ship. It's incredible. Wow, it's I'm not saying it is the best movie. I'm just saying to me it is like it's like like designed for me. But I suspect you fellas might find many of the same traits very appealing. Hey, you know,
be on this zoom call if you have daddy issues. Okay, right, great, great great.
You like the fact that Splinter admits that his entry point to ninja culture was these six samurai swords that he has framed next to his books.
But I I think on the balance, that's better than the other version, right, Like, yeah, the version I was sold as a child, I was.
Like, this is this yeah, just this just the ship where whatever version of him being a quote unquote actual ninja is fucking wild, right.
So I yeah, I think of the lesser of two evils choices or I I do think this kind of splits the difference because they're like, it's better if he's Asian, but it's better if he's not Japanese, right right right? I don't Again, I'm like choosing not to unpack any of this because I.
Did because you liked it so much.
Yeah, yeah, but you know that's me being a coward. Yeah, but yeah he is. He is both Asian and a weeb. The rare is splinter, rare spreader Rokusaki Still does they have they have that backstory with him. I'm gonna I'm gonna know spoilers there and say don't worry about it.
Okay, thank you. I like that, Yeah, don't worry about that part. I remember always as a kid, I was like, that's not a real Japanese name.
That bugged me as a kid.
I'm like, okay, Amato Yoshi, Like okay, that's that works.
Yeah, it's just one of those like it's really you know, it's based on a thing that is like sort of like well meaning, and it was a parody anyway, but it definitely you know, it's it's this like American take on Japanese. Noess that yeah, yeah, yeah, that is bad at its heart, Like no matter how like how much they they liked the idea of these turtles or Ninja's in general. So yeah, there's no it's very hard to imagine a good version where they're Japanese, I guess. Yeah, yeah, right,
is that true? I don't know. Yeah, that's my That's where I'm sitting, right, they're not yet because you want it to be like because they're like an analog for people who got like Asian culture through the media or something and.
Turtles bro, sorry these turtles ninjutsu okay, okay, yeah, anyway, that would be me being annoying to my kid as you watch. Yeah, say, real, just lead does not exist, no matter how much you wanted to.
Here's a little list, no it it. Yeah, look, the movies are back for now, and I was shocked. I had a great cinema week. Actually, we're just I'm just gonna sorry, since we're off in a tangent. I watched uh no, okay, I'll make this my my underrated anyway. Okay, it's just like the fucking like, yeah, the big movies are are whatever they're you know, they're good. People like them. This has been I watched Talk to Me, the horror movie, the Australian horror movie that should have been called Talk
to the Hand, but that's not my problem. It's about a hand where they yeah, yeah, they fight a curse at hand and it's like, my guys. And I also watched a movie that I think you guys would like a lot called The First Slam Dunk, which was like the feature of an anime called slam Dunk. Oh yeah, yeah yeah, and it's it's a high school like basketball championship in Japan and it is I'm not like a basketball head the way you guys are. So maybe this
is like more prevalent in the media. And I had never watched the anime TV show right however, it had like and also this should be should have been obvious. But they basically because it's animated, they really take advantage of the fact that they don't have to use this standard camera angles that you experienced basketball from, like you know, the the game shit right right right, So there's and I might be mistaken by this about the specifics of this,
but I'm trying to remember extly. There's like one shot near the I guess it must be there's a jump ball in the second half and the camera basically is in the perspective of.
The ball, and it's like fucking like it's going up. Yeah, try and go up.
For Yeah, it's so gorgeous. And but there's a lot of like first person stuff that like you know, you kind of can experience, but like there's a lot of it, and like the basketball, at least to my eye, is played like very real, Like it looks like it's almost like rotoscope from basketball players maybe or like I don't I don't even know how you make this fucking animation right right right.
That's so cool.
Yeah, I highly recommend.
I actually like up y'all, alley, I have no I have a Sakuragi Shohoku jersey like that because back in the because like slam Dunk was also like the like sort of injection point for sneaker culture in Japan too, because that like the guy who is who, Like, in a way, the guy who started it was a huge sneaker head, and like if when those early like mangas that he made of it, You're like, oh shit, this is We're in Jordan threes were in Jordan six is like you the amount of detail that went into their
sneakers was like fucking next level. So I was I was drawn in from that too as a kid too.
Don't quote me on this because I don't. I think it's like one of those things where like most of the brands are like like kind of that anime style, like kind of fake like analogs. There's like Green mart or whatever, except for the Jordan's look to my eye like perfect, yeah, we're not fucking around, I mean a little fake.
Like there is a like there's a Jordan's six like an official slam Dunk Jordan collab because of the.
You know, just the how deep that relationship was. It's very good. The movie is very good. It's for it is also like a lot of like teenagers to parents things. So maybe that's like a little bit of a theme. Actually, so always talked to me that's maybe I should have had kids.
But you saw those three films. Instead, it seems like.
Yeah, it really it really, Uh, it's a it's a very good movie. I it is not. It does not have a wide theatrical run. But if here in Los Angeles, I believe it's playing at the Edwardson Alhambra, which I'm unclear why that is awesome. Oh yeah, yeah, I know that one. Yeah, okay, it's right by. Even though it's in it's in a heart of some of the best Chinese food in southern California. It's also next to the Burger place. I like a lot called Grilla Mall.
So yeah, grilla start off amazing.
Yeah, yeah, it's pretty good.
They had one that's like the like the bread was grilled cheeses, right, yes, yes, that's that's the That's the what brought me out there the first time.
Listen, it's it's a rough time out there, and probably this is not the weather for that kind of food, but you do what you got to do.
What is uh, what's something you think is overrated? That?
Yes, that's a segue to my overrated, which is the thing that this strike has taught me is being comfortable mad overrated. I don't give a fuck anymore. I'm just like like slightly warm, a little sweaty. It's like, you know, because of so called climate change, at least comd now, which genuinely that was on my list of when I moved here. It's like, at least it's not humid now
we're humid Mosquito's like crazy mosquitos. Yeah, but I think I just my brain, the part of my brain that gives the fuck about being comfortable, really got shut off somewhere around like day twenty of the strike. So I've been very like fuck it, Yeah, I don't care anymore. I I went from one of the most comfortable shoes to who cares.
Wow, out there barefoot, we're in the pump.
I I wore I went for a pair of Tivas. Okay, Yeah, I've been go Tiva's occasionally, though, I'll just go, yeah, they're not they're not like walk that far on concrete comfy.
Oh they're not.
Okay, they're walking arounding me comfortable, Yeah, they're they're they're more like you know, a light, a.
Light walk in the woods or I don't know. I just I just don't. I just don't care anymore, which is because I used to be a person that was so like couldn't handle any discomfort. Now I'm just I think.
You know what, and I'm sure I'm not that good. But for me, I'm right. Well, I'm sure part of that too is like you're now motiva. Your motivations are different, whereas before where it's like fine, if I got to go out there and be out there, yeah comfortably, versus like, oh, okay, so you're trying to fucking wear me down.
Fuck you. Yeah, I am. I am become death. I'm the Yeah, I'm I am the I am just like I've been ground down to the little like no, I'm like the seed in the middle of the plumb, and you know, what the fuck are you gonna do to me? I don't care.
There you go. That's why I take an ice bath every morning, you know.
Yeah, that's right, that's right.
I do feel like I need something like I need to do something uncomfortable early in my day or else, not not an ice bath, but like or else I will just like retreat into like I don't know, because I'm a very like interior person and so like I need to like get out of my body and wait, wait.
Go on this now this kind of resonates with me. What do you mean, like, because I feel the same way. So you you try and push yourself to do something like what do you mean, Like is that when you just like like exercise or something like that.
Yeah, yeah, I'll jump in the pool when it's cold enough, like just get going do something that's uncomfortable, and like that is movement because otherwise I just yeah, like otherwise I just will be comfortable inside my body in a way that like then I don't know, it fucks me up. It just leaves me sort of in a little cocoon. So I've actually been trying to focus on just being more comfortable with discomfort like as a general Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah.
I mean, look, I know you guys have actual human beings here responsible for in a more important way. But that's a little bit what having a dog, like an old dog too. It's just like I gotta get the fuck up because like she got a walk, Yeah, and it doesn't matter like however uncomfortable it is, cleaning up whatever mess shoe makes. If adult get her walk in time is much worse.
So right, things about to go off?
Yeah, yeah, it's just like it creates like it's incentive of like fuck fuck fuck good, great, let's go. Yeah, my baby can't even walk yet.
It's like, yeah, I think I think it's probably easier than having a dog, actually, because for now, yeah, I guess so for now in my very narrow perspective, Yeah, I'm gonna go ahead and say.
A lot easier. You guys are gonna have real annoying la Like I guess you were already a real annoying la kid.
Yeah, the cool the cool ones come from the valley, you know, like Molly Lambert, you know what I mean, Like, yeah, yeah, we have like that cynicism of growing up here that we're not like West Side kids who are like.
On some fucking's ship, like everything's okay and have so much money kind of thing. We're like, yeah, nah, a little bit different, right, because from when you grow up there, it's like, you know, everyone is a clown, so you're not scared of them, but you're also not like yeah, you still got that edge to you. Yeah, and also yeah, you're not impressed by that. Don't impress me much, you know what I mean? Yeah, yes, yeah, yes, thank you saying that all the time.
That don't impress me much. Yeah, I feel like the when you think about like why there are so many, so many Canadian comedians. Early on, like one of the best explanations I read was that, like they are have a lot of the same ship as our culture. They get like a lot of what the same culture that we view like incoming, but they're like add enough of a distance that like they view it through a reflect
refracted lens. I feel like you got that with the Valley too, That's what that's where we get MoMA Lambert and Paul Thomas Anderson.
That's what we call it. We call it the Canada of La County.
That's right. And they appreciate it and they love it.
And I was fit.
I wasn't like I feel a connection to the people of New Jersey that yes, we're like, yeah, we're like the people like where again the West side Hollywood, La people thumb their noses that the people from the valley, like, we got our own ship over here. That's why people are like, yeah, the bridge and tunnel. I'm like, I see you, I see you.
Yeah. All right, let's take a quick break and we'll come back and we'll talk about the strike. We'll be right back and we're back. Before we get into the
strike real quick on the subject of what we're talking about. Okay, So I just I just did the Wire podcast with Matt Leeb and it was the episode after Stringer Bells untimely demise and they go into his apartment and he has samurai swords and France on the wall, and I was like, I definitely at the time when it came out, and then like mcnolty like takes Adam Smith's like, you know, first book, whatever the fuck the like book that it invented modern day economics, like off his thing, and it's like,
who the hell was I chasing? And I at the time was like, damn, Stringer Bell is so tight, bro. There's like a water feature in his apartment and ship. But it made me wonder like did the writers of The Wire where they like this is tight, people are going to recognize how tight this dude is or were they like this is kind of funny, like he he is basically like a finance bro.
Like a hustle culture yeah yeah, or that like he just knew what he liked, you know, like that he was so secures, like yeah, I'm a samurai sword type.
Yeah.
I just wish there was a scene with him. It's just it sucks as a reveal though, because I would have loved to see Stringerbell maneuvering so fucking Katana or some ship seeing what the fuck you could just like a.
Dark room, like in a in a robe, just like doing some like by himself. But he's like not that good at it.
Yeah, or he's he's got he's got Blade on the big screen and he's like the movie.
His wall has like cuts in it and ships.
It's just all copies of Ghost Dog on your DVD. Yeah, that's the only movie that matters. Man?
Who who about? All right, let's get into the strike right. You had a recent tweet about how this like the thing that's different this time, Like the studios their whole stance is very predictable, just oh, there's gonna be assholes in this very predictable way, but that there seems like there's like the thing that's been surprising is the level of solidarity on the strike side. Like what have you seen there?
Like what would what? So?
Yeah?
Yeah, I was not in the Union in two thousand and eight, but I actually was. Weirdly, that was when some of my friends had started getting their first TV jobs, and I was actually working at Comedy Central, so I was like occasionally having a cross a picket line in
New York, which was like fucking horrible. But so from what I remember of those days, slash just like what people have been saying, I guess like to back up too, like like my The reason I tweeted that was basically the AMPTP, who are the motion picture television producers the studios, not really the actual actual producers, are not happy that producers in that title, because right actual producer are closer
to the concerns of the workers. But this was off of them at literally like one hundred days and change, asking seriously to come back to the negotiating table, which is exactly what happened essentially like last strike when just over one hundred days. The reason that sort of like the like conventional wisdom is because that's when they can
start canceling some overall deals. I mean they have canceled some or paused some, but basically they the conventional wisdom goes, that's when they can get stuff off their books, like deals they want to get out of and the peers that they have. Basically, and the reason that's conventional wisdom is because that's the first time the studios like get something out of going forcing us to go on strike.
They get to recoup a little bit of money. And thus after this it's all sort of diminishing returns for them. There's no reason unless they want to just pack it up on the entertainment industry, there's no reason for them to keep the strike going any longer. So that was
like utterly predictable. The other thing that was utterly predictable was that DGA would take a you know, I know there are directors who are happy with the deal they got, but I think most people understand that they got a not that great deal and they did it in a way to lessen solidarity from the other guilds, you know, by agreeing to a a thing that one one I feel like I'm just talking so you know, jump in whatever. But like they took a deal where they didn't get
streaming residuals. I believe, Oh, it has been one of our main points. Essentially, they they kind of we knew they would like stab everyone else in the back and they get you know, the other thing they could have done, which is what our leadership appears to be asking for is the right for us to stand in solidarity with SAG the actors even after our contract is ratified. So that basically is what the teamsters have and I believe I have some version of this too. IATSI or the
crew people on there. There are many things, but as far as Hollywood goes there they are the crew people. So yeah, so you know, I guess what I'm saying is like, at every stage, if it could have gone one way or the other, it has been more in the case of on the side of solidarity, we the writers have been more in solidarity with each other, save for a few like high profile mostly white guys talking about how they don't give a shoot about their union
show runner types. But you know, compared to last time, when apparently there were just like deep divisions evident immediately. And this is also like sort of I don't know if it was. It was certainly pre wide adoption of Twitter. I'm not going to look up when Twitter started. It was a two thousand and seven, two thousand and eight, so there's probably some kind of.
It really hit the scene two thousand and nine, I feel like is when effected, when we really started being like.
Hey, that's how you can follow food trucks. Yeah, exactly.
It was when Michael Jackson passed away.
That was like June two thousand and nine, right, yeah, yeah, like like so a culture where we can all communicate better, so for those things.
And then, unexpectedly at the beginning or unexpected at least two me a rank and file member of the guild, the teamsters announced they would stand in solidarity with us, which allowed us to shut down productions much earlier, because you know, teamsters have negotiated into their contract a right not to cross a picket line, which is a legal right that has to be fought for. So yeah, they would.
I mean, I remember in the first and second week of the strike, I was out at fucking four am at Paramount and it was kind of like this magical thing where it's like two people can constitute a picket line, and so it was just two people at each gate and trucks were turning around, they were not making their deliveries, and teamsters were very like, you know, I was gonna say kindly, but it's not really kindness, but they were, you know, losing work to stand in solidarity with us, right,
and that was you know, amazing and then individual Iazzi members had a little more latitude. And course, you know, you don't begrudge anyone their need to make their day's money, but there were Ayazi members who also didn't cross the line, and that's how we got production shut down, as far as I understand, much earlier than last strike, right, because
people were more on our side than we thought. And then when SAG came up for their contract negotiation, you know, conventional wisdom was sort of just like, they're probably going to take a not great deal after DGA, it did
even seem like that's how things were going. I'm only I speak with no insider information, but just like from the outside of SAG, you know, it seemed like they were making all the moves to just settle for whatever, and they you know, they were given a They released their deal points the same way the WJ board did
and it was preposterous. It was disgusting. They were There were things like the studios were proposing scanning background actors and simply owning their likeness forever in a digital form. And so for that reason, coupled with I believe, like you know, there was that there was like an open letter signed by a bunch of a listers to SAG leadership that was like, do not take a fucking bad deal. And it did appear to work because the tenor of
the conversation from ZAG communication changed drastically after that. You know, it was there's a lot of rumors about what they were really trying to do, But the fucking week after fucking frint dressers out there being like, you know, fuck you, right after kicking it with Kim Kardashian. Right, Yeah, It's one of those things where you're like, you know, there, it's sort of unclear how they arrived at that position,
but they're indisputably there. They're they're you know, doing some things that I personally maybe equibble with strategically, but the fact is there are fucking, you know, one hundred and sixty some thousand actors like out there, they're on the picket line. There have been a little bit of growing pains, which just like swelling the strike by eleven times, but you know, just basically logistics. But it is like it's been.
It literally is some like real cavalry shit, like, yeah, the actors are here, and you know that's all actors. You know, I imagine what they're the heroes, so good for.
They look great, but good lord, But I mean, yeah, really, so you're not surprised by anything you're seeing from them. I don't think anyone who's been paying attention to corporations,
and these corporations in particular, are surprised. They definitely seem surprised by like the front that they're getting, like the United Front, the like lack of public support seems to really have them being like, I think I'm the bad guy, like and Iiger seem to be having a I bet they're on the phone every night just talking to each other, like what what is happening?
They genuinely thought I think it worked well in two thousand and eight. They they genuinely thought they could like bully bluster and like so discord among the union members. I think again, social media spent a big help and like eliminating some of that. But also here's my pet theory, which is like they, uh, you kind of forget the peer group these fuckers run in, but you can't. You have to kind of remember that. To them, Ted Sarandos is like their cool hacker nephew.
So like Ted Sarandos, I'm sure in those Netflix Yeah yeah, sorry headed Netflix, Yeah, you know, and a tech guy. I'm sure he's telling you know, but it's still like a dozen decrepit mostly met white men, like like billionaires, like completely out of touch. So to them, like Ted Sarandos is the equivalent of your like zoomer showing you no, this is better than TikTok.
Like yeah, yeah, yeah, you know how you watch pa per view fight on Twitter? Grandpa? Yeah, so he's like so he's like there, you know, and fucking read Hastings or whatever. All the Netflix tech guys i'm sure are like to these old old the old media billionaires are like they said, these guys, you know, does one thing These guys know it's digital, they know the Internet, and they say we're gonna win. They say that people are going to be on our side, and I think they
just believe them. I don't think they have anyone in their circle who's like, no, you guys are villainous clowns. Like maybe there's like a communications like officer, you know, if you're if you're the.
They haven't they haven't arrived at the are we the baddies moment yet?
Yeah?
Yeah, I think they're on their way.
They do have that one billionaire who owns the jewelry company who Cardier is Cardier, the Cardier billionaire owner who's losing sleep, and they're like, what the fuck's going on with him? Like he needs to.
What's crazy is they actually need a cousin, Greg, Like they just need someone to be like, hey, I don't think this is working, Like fuck off, Greg. Yeah, if I were to posit this theory to the council, as it were, are not on our side.
But I think it's also important, right, and especially talking about the solidarity right because the last time there was a dual strike was in nineteen sixty and this last time the WJ and the writers went on strike, and it's really instructive to like really to learn.
About just what the history of.
Labor negotiations in Hollywood have been like, because it's been a fucking exploitative cash grab from the beginning, and in nineteen sixty many people you hear a lot like Actually, Ronald Reagan has played a huge part because he was
SAG president. He actually had two stints as SAG president, one in the flate forties and early fifties, and then again he came back for this strike in nineteen sixty and a lot of articles have like heavily sanitized his actions as like SAG president saying that like he had the overwhelming of SAG members when he agreed to this new deal and with that, and which is true because
peop want to get back to work. But the other thing was and that like without him, there wouldn't be a pension fund for actors, so we have to thank him for that. But if you look closely, you see a story of a fucking guy that was just self dealing and could give a fuck less about his fellow workers. So after World War two, right, people just stopped going to the movies like they used to, and the decline
was noticeable. So the studios decided to go in big on this new technology called broadcast television and decided.
That was because TV became a thing. They were like, what the fuck?
Okay, fine, well, what are we gonna do to make money? Well, they decided to license their films for broadcasts and sell them to all these TV stations, and that how they're that's how they're making money. But this move brought, you know, seminal films into American homes and people were engaging with motion pictures again. But what about that money? A lot of people were like, hold on, man, I'm in this movie, where the fuck is my check?
Ah?
Well, you see, uh, all of these films were only making money for the studios and none a single cent was going to the people that wrote or starred in them at all. It was only benefiting the studios. So they wanted to strike get their money that was owed to them. And Reagan returned as SAG president for this, and he sorted out a deal in five weeks. Really easy,
really easy. Here's another thing we don't realize is the writers they actually started they were on strike before the actors, and they were on strike for twenty one weeks in nineteen sixty because they were unwilling to take these like bullshit deals that were They're like, no, we want a percentage. We need you to articulate five percent. Like there's there's like real math involved with what the writers were fighting for.
So they got, you know, we come back. Reagan's like, yeah, well, I've got this deal.
Want to take it down?
And basically the actors would receive residuals only for films beginning production after the basically starting from nineteen sixty onward when they started striking, like, all right, y'all gets for the shit y'all make now, And everyone's like, well, what about the other shit? What about from nineteen sixty to
shit at least nineteen forty eight. Well, basically, since they weren't paying residuals on that, they said, okay, we'll cut y'all a check for two point sixty five million dollars for a pension fund.
Yea. And people were like, oh great, but if again, if you look at the time, everyone was saying they wanted at least four million dollars for this fund. That's what they're like, all right, if you want to do that, like, you need to meet us at this four million mark.
They got away with that shit too. So essentially, no money right now except in the form of a pension fund is what the actors got then, all because of Ronald Reagan. And you're probably thinking about the other part is what about movies before nineteen forty eight, like shit like Gone with the Wind, Wizard of Oz, Citizen Kane. What about those deals? Well, here's where Reagan comes back
into the story. He was SAG president between nineteen forty seven and nineteen fifty two, and he forfeitted royalties on films made before nineteen forty eight in exchange for the promise of talking about negotiating over royalties for films made after nineteen fifty one. Yeah, so I was like, all right, fuck that, we don't need to see anything before nineteen forty eight.
Well, what affects me too? But like his movies that he's like that are affected by it, are like sleepover parties with orang of Tangs and shit, yeah, bedtime for Bonzo, I think what you're talking about.
Yeah, exactly.
So he basically left all that money on the table and were just saying, all right, well, let's negotiate for stuff from fifty one onward that and and it was because of that move that precipitated the fucking dual strike in nineteen sixty because Ronald Reagan again was like, hey, whatever y'all want, Okay, whatever, It's fine.
Yeah.
Apart from like a few exceptions, right, So again, a lot of many of these actors felt so betrayed by Ronald Reagan. We're like, we created the industry for these people to be in, and you've left us fucking out to dry and so again all these the only thing that a lot of these people got after nineteen sixty was pension fund. And this is where you kind of you get you get to see the Reagan noess of it all, Like you're like, why would Ronald.
Reagan do this?
It's like, well, he knew he wasn't gonna make money off royalties. He was looking at bigger shit. So an interesting dimension is his agent was a man named Lou Wasserman, who was the president of MCA, which is like a you know multi they do music, film, television, whatever at the time after the strike, when when Reagan got them to agree to that shitty deal, he left his positions at SAG and got took a lucrative production deal with MCA,
like two months after. Like if we had Twitter, people have been like, Oh, that's what the fuck.
Is going on?
And it's crazy. It's like when the plot twist in episode nine of Star Wars is like the bad guy's Emperor Palpatine again. It's like, Oh, it's always the same motherfucker. That's all you just got. Reagan killed unions at the beginning of the eighties. He killed He's like fucking everybody over like that in the fifties and sixties, it's like, yeah.
Hey, maybe Reagan just was that awful dude the whole time. It's so weird, how like that, Yeah, that he needs to be lionized from time to time, like even by people who really should fucking know better.
Yeah, like, tear down every single myth about Ronald Reagan. I think there's a book called tear down this myth? My was it tear off my balls? Tear off my balls? So anyway, the other things that are wild too, because this guy was so power hungry. He was doing he was willing to do anything right, including being a fucking informant to the FBI. And he gave testimony in nineteen forty seven when he was first like entering the SAG leadership about striking Hollywood workers being the bye product.
Of subversive elements aka communists.
And he regularly fed the FBI information on people he even personally just suspected of being a communist with very little evidence, if anything.
That the people's so much of the twentieth century just the bad guys.
Won, Yeah, and exactly and so and so if you think about it, it's like this was all it can all boil back to like these very early conversations where the norm was always going to be yeah, take this like shit, deal with the vague promises of something better down the road, and we'll just kick the can down the road because at the end of the day, we want to hoover up as much of this money as possible.
And that just one last thing about it, which is wild is if you think about like all of this stuff pre nineteen forty eight and shit like that, So like people like you know, Ted Turner bought the film libraries of like RKO, which is like pre like old school Warner Brothers and MGM and Turner Classic Movies was basically a free money printing machine because he's like, oh, this is all IDAs that you don't have to pay.
It's free.
Yeah, it's all fucking free. And so we so a lot of the things that I think consumers were like, oh wow, that's on TV. A lot people are getting money from that. It's further from the case. And like, I don't know, Andrew, like, how would you how would you describe to somebody? Because I've heard from people who like talk about the strike who are like a film adjacent, people who like maybe do a lot of catering for
stuff or like you know, work in other departments. There was like, well the writers like they're just they get everything they want. These people are all rich and I and I want to really reiterate that this is a job where people are barely They can't even put their kids through school, you know, when they're trying to. So how would you how would you describe what the lifestyle is of someone who is trying to just be a
writer in the industry? And if is it just all champagne parties all day and you have no bills to pay exactly?
It's I mean, look, and this is also a today of it. Like I think at there there was a time when at least the wh when a network and cable was like equitable. It was like you worked a job and you had about a middle class existence. It was just about where I would be or maybe even a little nicer depending on how well your show did
AKA how well you did your gibe. So yeah, I just since I'm here, it was one of those things where I'll just do the long version of this, which is like at the beginning of the strike, I was like, you know, I'm I'm like doing Okay, you know, I work and in the last like you know, one hundred days, one hundred and four days, like I've really been seeing like oh shit, I specifically was like screwed for doing kind of the same work. And so the example that is like very stark is the lash I worked on
was that nineties show which is on Netflix. It's one of those like multi caam streaming reboots. No promo, no promo though, no promo though, yeah exactly, no fuck them done, any promo. No, I'm like truly gonna tell you why. And the prior to that, I worked on a show called Mixed which was a spin off of Blackish, which was on ABC. So just like the kind of like hard facts example, I mean Mixed Dish was never like a huge hit. We got like a second season, but
you know, it wasn't killing it ratings wise. I'm very you know, I'm very honored to working on the show, and it's I thought we did a great job and I've met so many amazing people. However, you know, it wasn't like, you know, overwhelmingly crushing it, whereas ninety show. Apparently because one of the other things the MPTP refused to do is divulge their streaming numbers. But you know it was a huge hit. According to them, it was
the number one streaming on Netflix for like several weeks. Yeah, just trust this, So by their metrics, a quote unquote huge hit. And look, I mean, I guess there's a possibility more residuals will come through, but sort of to date, I have made per episode somewhere on the order of one hundred times more per episode of Mixed Dish that I have my name on than my episode of nineties show.
One hundred times yes, and that is again marginal, like solid show versus a you know, by their by their reckoning, like I hit a humongous So so basically that's like what the royalty structure on streaming versus network is. It's literal. Pennies are more than pennies on the dollar. And so residuals is a thing that I think people you know, feel a certain way about, right you, Most people at their job don't get paid for the thing they make
over time. However, so the reason residuals are to our minds a fair thing is these we only get paid if the studio continues to resell our creative product continues to make money from it. So so the reason for instance, like like when when my episode of Mixed Dish replays overseas or plays on video and demand, I get a tiny percentage of that money that they make, whereas there's no real equivalent or sorry, there's an equivalent, but it's
much lower on streaming. Yeah, you know, one one hundredths about as far as I know, Like I don't know, I guess all the ins and outs, but it has been really stark and like making no money for this hit. And you know you hear many stories people just routinely. Yeah, Cody Zigler, who's been on the show before, a friend of mine, made a three figure check for his hit episode of she Hulk, which again was one of the
highest rated according to them, highest rated things on Disney Plus. So, and the reason you need residuals is because that is sort of because we are not full time employees. Like we're not someone who like is hired by a studio or hired by producer just able to work all the time. So the compromise is sort of like in exchange for when we do stuff that does amazingly well, we are compensated and able to like like participate in that well
performing thing. So the other thing that is like a direct way that I was like, oh, this is a one to one and how I've been specifically screwed is I worked on that ninety show, which is a reboot of that seventy show. If anyone's ever watched both shows they were created, you know, we have like our showrunner was like a that seventy show writer, the creators and executive producers or writing and in the room with us,
like it was exactly it's the same fucking sets. Like it's the exact same process of making that ninety show as making that seventy show, except we had approximately half the writers, which in a show like that makes it very difficult because what you're doing is like pitching jokes and at a certain point it's just like a volume thing, like you know, there's only so many fresh takes and there's only so many resources that you can have to
make the exact same product. So yeah, it was just one of those things where I was like, oh, man, you know, that show was like very very difficult to make, and I think like unnecessarily so because of because of the resources that we had writing wise, which is again a tiny fraction, like single digit percentages of the budget, and you know, and then also just my development as a writer suffered, Like I was often just like either in over my head, like having to run the joke
room for instance, which is like usually, you know, someone more senior than me would be doing that because we would have twice as many people, so so working with like half as many people often without enough, you know. And I don't really mean to say this as like a ding on the actual people running ninety show, but it was just like, you know, I who the fuck knows, but I guess it's like we were like slightly just like under resource the whole time in a way that
was like incredibly difficult for doing the exact same job. Again, it was exactly the same work as making seventy show, and people who wrote episodes of that seventy show, you know, conservatively because it was on Fox, like high mid six figures probably over the lifetime and residuals maybe like it was a ton of money for doing the exact same work. So in multiple ways, like analogous to old school like
TV writers even from like five six years ago. I'm like, really, and I kind of didn't realize how screwed I was until spending a bunch of time on the picket line talking to people, and I was like, oh, right, right, yeah, like I thought I was doing okay, and then I was like, oh, I've really been getting fucked for like apples to apples work like literally the exact same thing, or in my I would argue more difficult.
Right, all right, Actually, before we keep going on this, let's take a quick break and we'll be right back. And we're back. It sounds like there's an incentive for
not even like acknowledging a hit show. And I know that's also like always been a traditional like you know the thing that people said about the entertainment industry, right like the first Indiana Jones movie, Like it's still like according to the studio that made it like not profitable, you know, like like that, right, it's like creative bookkeeping
to keep people from participating. But it does feel like there is like we don't even know when a show is a hit anymore, and like it's just like they dumped so much content you me, like shows on the like on their streaming networks without like even trying to promote when like one of them was a hit. It
was just all like invisible. And it's like all these things that supposedly millions and millions of people are watching and are entering like should be an a like cultural like bloodstream and like these are the ideas that are like affecting the zeitgeist, and they're just like completely invisible. Do you do you think that's connected to the streamers just being so kind of guarded about letting their data.
Yeah, well, one is they might simply be I'll say, you know, using creative statistics, right of bullshitting right, Yeah, Like that's certainly a possibility. But the other thing is, yeah, has been like their model is like so driven by people who apparently don't like or watch TV or understand how culture works at all, Like down to the binging. Yeah,
it's it's Wall Street and Silicon Valley's influence. Like you can see that happening because it's not like there aren't things that can happen, right, even like on the streamers like a squid game or like you know, you know just what ever, like you know, jury Duty. Yeah, like things things can break through and make a cultural impact. But I think it is because these people essentially what
their business model is. And you can tell Sorry, this is all my own speculation, I should say, is like you watch them trying to feed this like concept of quote content like you see it in like HBO Max, like David's aslif just thinks of everything as content, like he's like House Hunters and Game of Thrones is equally equally a creative endeavor. Yeah, Like like that is like very important to their worldview. It's just like minutes to
eyeballs and fill in tape essentially. So so that I think is also why like like they they don't like they seem to have an interest in devaluing the business model. And I will just throw this out there. It it if you look at the way Silicon Valley has and things to other industries. I think Uber is a great example, or like ride shares in general, like they just go in operate at a loss in an attempt to destroy the industry and create some kind of monopoly, which is
arguably what Netflix is doing. And then you know, either jacking up the prices or just sort of leaving the industry to like fucking deal with the greater pieces and society. Yeah, I don't know, So that it just seems like like
Netflix essentially. So the the other upshot of all this is that like because we like, streamers play much fewer residuals off of like because we say so data Netflix and in Netflix, you know, or the streamers having like pioneered this practice of mini rooms, which is like again what I went through with nineties show, like hiring much fewer people, asking them to do much more work, and
doing it for a shorter period of time. We like they're essentially just begging to be able to operate at a lower cost, which is like, hey, maybe you just don't get to if you're not smart enough to make money like from television, like America's greatest import or export,
like the most powerful thing. Like other countries realize this, Like fucking China understands that it's important to have, Like they obviously want to screw their workers too, but they at least understand it's important from a fucking even if you're like a complete like you know, if you really don't care about this, like just from a geopolitical standpoint, like Great Britain gets to continue to be a world power, you know, decades edging on century like after their their
fucking little empire like crumbles because people because the Beatles. The Beatles is soft power that resonates. You know this, we still have like my my, like dumb family who were literally victimized by the British being like sad when Queen Elizabeth dies, Like that's power, that's like fucking power. And the fact that we appear to be like willing
to give that away. So what I should say is what I say give that away is if the studios get what they want, that will within you know, five ten something years, be the end of like working as a creative in Hollywood being a middle class sustainable existence, like it simply will be not possible. There will not
be any staff writers. Like essentially that will then become if you are a low level level television writer, it's sort of the equivalent of an internship, like essentially, like only rich kids will be able to do it right and like that it just is basically then becoming a writer in Hollywood, as is what I know most about,
is a lottery ticket. You know, some of you will be able to make it on merit, but also luck some of you will be able to just outlast because you could run at a deficit for five, six, seven, eight, nine years. Look and it, by the way, is already like this, but it will make it worse. And if the proposal the SAG goes through, that's like essentially trying
to break the union from a pension perspective. If if what they put on the table was there, like they would end background acting as a profession and that would completely decimate Sorry I should say all this is as I understand it. Adam Conover probably has the actual Notes version of this, but like that just fucking ends acting
as like a job. It ends acting as a job and turns it into a gig, which is just that that's how we start to tell fewer interesting stories, fewer new people will come through, will start to be doing the same thing over and over and over again, and we will start losing to creative people, creative countries. Like it's just it's very weird, No, but it is like sort of pathetic, how like short term that all these folks thinking.
Yeah, yeah, because yeah, I mean like for the longest time we were always like, how the fuck is Netflix a company? Because all I would be like, they're just deficit spending and deficits yeending and deficit spending, and I was always asking, like other people I knew who were like at the executive of them, like what is there? Like I remember ten year or maybe like eight years ago, asking like what the fuck is their plan?
Exactly?
Yeah, And someone was like, they're probably hoping something like an Apple or Google will just buy them at first. Yeah, kind of like the thought and it won't matter how much they've they've spent or burned up, because that would be the end goal. But then also once Wall Street started rewarding that stock to say, oh, well, it's really not about the profits they're showing. It's about look at their their market share that they're devouring and look at
the potential. It's like it's like Tesla, where it's like, don't look at like the facts and figures of the business because it's dog shit. Think you'll like what this can do for the future. That's what you're buying into. And then once Flix was like, oh we just had a subscriber loss, Wall Street basically said fuck all you guys for not being profitable. And then the reaction from the studios is all right, well now we gotta cut shit.
Now we gotta do people gotta do less. We've got to do more with less, which is of a theme that many people across the country are familiar with, no matter what industry you're in, it's like, hey, do more
for less. And we find ourselves in this position now where we're completely like like in a way inadvertently or very advertently, you're starting to see all of like the the gains that were made in like equitable representation from like the kinds of creators that were getting shows and the kinds of people we saw being the faces on
the screen. We're just gonna we're just regressing right back to the fucking status quo where it's like, I don't know, we don't have time to tell black stories or trans stories as we don't have time, Like what's the new fucking ip? We can just dust off and do another They're gonna just spin off of Nurse Jackie. Yeah, like what the fuck are doing worse than the status quote because it's the satus quote. But also they don't pay
people living wages right, Like is the actual plan? Yeah, they like Wiley Coyote themselves off a financial cliff, but the problem is they can bring all of us with them.
And they're trying to do that. Yeah, that is it appears to be the plan. And like, you know, I mean it's just like this thing where I was like again watching watching, how much like the same work is not being rewarded or being devalued. Oh sorry, that was the other thing with the with the deficit spending things. Like they also didn't really do a good job with the money they spend. No, Like it's like because they just think again, minutes of tape is the only metric
that matters. And it's so bizarre how it, Like any fool could have told you that's not how culture works, except for these bozos, like they misunderstand how culture works. It's also this thing, So the other sticking point in this strike has been AI and like you know, the fact that like I understand AI can do you know, will start to very quickly approach the old thing, you know, perfect replicas of whatever the fuck existed in the past. Right, But like I think, like these people like seem to
misunderstand that culture is novel. Like they they just do not get that, like there is a need for something new, right, and like their little plagiarism machine, you know it maybe can you know through dint of like random remixing. Essentially, like come up with something that does appeal to a novel center of the culture's brains. But that's also because like some creative person picked that instance out of this pile of fucking ten thousand or ten million, Like it's
still required like a a even you know. So that's like every time everyone anyone posts like AI art, it's like, oh, it's over for creatives. It's like, I don't, you know, far be it for me to defend the creativity of these AI fucking evangelists. But they're misunderstanding that they picked the instance that was like pleasing to some center of their brain and shared with everyone that that the AI doesn't know that this one's better than the other fucking
nine million versions it made. It still requires like a human sense of novelty and joy and wonder and experience to like have this mean something. I don't know, maybe I'm fucking I'm sure there's some like AI person that disagrees with me on this, But the.
Second that it puts out the an actual flawless Seinfeld episode, then I think we're still.
Okay, you know, But.
Yeah, like that even that would be an old show, like there are plenty of right now. I'd write a flawless Seinfeld episode right now, like that's the thing that it misses is and I agree that, Like it feels like they're already shading in this direction when you look at what they did with that spending, with all the money they spent, where it was like a lesser diminished like amount of production resources per show. And then you like look at all these streaming shows that are like
they have these crazy high numbers like that. This one article Will lenk Off to on the footnotes talks about the show The Night Agent being this huge like Netflix show and they're talking to the showrunner who's like, yeah, but I'm like not not being compensated like it's a
hit Netflix show or a hit any show. And but like that show like doesn't really exist as far as like Pete, like I just it came and went and like I wasn't aware I had it confused with The Bodyguard, I think, and the guy plays it is like look similar to the Bodyguard, and but it like I watched you know, fifteen minutes of it and it feels like it could have been generated by an AI that it ingested every procedural like up to like for the past
thirty years like that. Yeah, it feels like, yes, AI is actually in line with what they think they're trying to do. It's just what they think they're trying to do is going to not make anything good, like good enough to actually like propel the entertainment and like the art. Yeah that is that like drives culture forward into the future, and.
They're just killing something that is innately human about people like wanting to create and to be creative. Like yeah, because the way these studios and executives look at the nature of creativity is like it's the same way a senator would look at what they're going to read if they're trying to fillibuster.
It's like, yeah, man, just say shit, just say worse. That's all you gotta do is matter.
Just read from the phone book and that'll that's enough to tick those just as good, right, and think of how uninteresting what happens when you shift gear to we'll just read from the phone book. The most entertaining thing might be when they don't know how to pronounce a certain name. And that's like the height of like fucking
entertainment or whatever. Because more and more it's just looked at what we just need to hear words and visuals be put out there for people to stare out creativities and like a non issue.
And I think that's really.
A violent part like about it is that we're taking that sort of ability for a human being to pursue something like that, to have an imagination and to be able to sustain their life with it. Just it's not even it's not even possible.
But like like even in your example, right, like like stumbling over a word is something only a fucking human could do, right, Like Like also it's it's like this like like they're they're the myths that got built around like like Netflix, the myths that they're built on. Is like we had an algorithm that told us that people like Kevin Spacey and political drama, and therefore we green lay house of Cards and look like the computer did that.
No human could do that, which like ignores their like the things that don't work that it ignores the things that haven't worked that have been algorithm driven. And also it's like this such a funny thing. It's like you know what put Amazon streaming on the map? Fucking transparent, which, by the way, not one computer at any point ever, was like, do you know what we need now? Like you know this this story transparent, so like like they're working from just like this law of tiny numbers. I
mean that was my other experience. Wow, this is maybe maybe talking out of school, but I think this is a common enough experience, which is like we had a moment in nineties show where they were insistent. Okay, I guess I just won't say exactly what the thing that we're insisting on, but they had a note for our opening credit sequence that was basically like the algorithm says you have to do this or else no one will watch it. And when I tell you, it was an utterly, utterly,
utterly inconsequential note. From a creative perspective, it was just like technically going to be very difficult to do, and they're like, our data shows that this has to be
this way. And like having worked in the network side of entertainment before, and I worked with executives and watched our research department routinely lie to them like essentially or obfuscate with statistics, and having taken a little bit of statistics in my life, I'm like, you don't have enough data to know, like you simply like this niggling, tiny thing that doesn't really make any difference, Like you're insistent on it because your date. You're like, legitimately, statistically and
significant data tells you one thing, but it doesn't. The reality is it doesn't matter, and the fact that you are killing multiple executives and a high price showrunner's day arguing about this is like flushing money down the toilet, ye, because you worship an algorithm, but you also don't have the statistic knowledge to like actually say this is inconsequential. They had an inconsequential fight all because I'm like, you haven't produced that many show opens before, so you don't know.
You just don't have a data set that tells you, like whether this creative choice or this creative choice makes the most difference in this And again, cannot stress enough it did not make a difference, right.
I bet that executive was like, see those hits, see those numbers. That's yeah, because yeah, yeah, well, Andrew, such a pleasure having to come you.
What it's actually like, thank you for letting me talk so long.
We're like we want to I mean every time I see you post from the picket lines or like whatever you're observing your tweets almost like we gotta have Andrew to talk about also like and also like again, I think there's just such a misconception of what it means to work as a creative person in the industry because most people just think they're just thinking of the exceptions and yes, rather than that, there is such an occupation where you just are trying to like hone your craft
of writing and it could render you an income that you could live off of. And yeah, and that's it. It's not it's not yacht money. It can be yacht money, you know, God willing, but for the most part, it's it's like anything else do by the same thing. We have people who wanted they got to take side gigs. Now it's like, but I thought you were writing on this show. Well no, no, now I'm doing uber. Now I'm doing this because it's actually not that kind of money.
I I think if it helps, like you know, just from the like actors, right, like the criticism of like look at these millionaires asking for more money, and it's like, it's actually the millionaires foregoing money to help everyone else, Like far be it for me to like you know, kiss these rich people's asses, but in this instance, right, they are no, but truly it's like, yeah, he they are like giving, They're they're leaving money on the table
to help other people. Like from the SAG thing. I think I read the minimum per year you have to make in SAG to qualify for health insurance is somewhere like twenty five thirty K something like that. Yeah, and around eighty five percent of their union do not make that from acting work. So this is not like rich people. This is people like trying to do a thing that
they love that makes money. Hollywood is immensely profitable, so like the things that we do generate money, and we would just be able to like to be able to like live off of that, and I would like to, Like that's the fucking thing. It's like, I don't know, like going back to work is going to be hard, but like we love TV and movies and whatever. Media is, you know part part of this, you know, high high
budget YouTube shows whatever. I fucking this shit. These people that were negotiating against by their actions do not even seem to like or understand any of this stuff, right, Yeah, And it is like they think that our love for this is their leverage to exploit us, and on some level it is and will be. But like you know, we're at the ledge and like at a certain point, the strike is like necessary because it's like there's no version where if we accept the deal they put on
the table, there would even be an industry. So like they forced us to be, you know, in survival mode. So that's it, Like, good fucking luck here we are surviving.
Yeah, amazing. Yeah, when when Zaslav was like, I think a love of work will bring the strike to an end, he was like telling on himself that He's just Yeah, these people seem to like have this weird thing they want their game back.
Yeah, it's it's like so pathetic.
Is there where can Bell find you and follow you on all that good stuff?
Oh you gotta hit me up on threads? Yeah, andrew t everywhere? Yeah, if you can. We're still doing the Yosis Racist podcast. We actually started on the premium show doing my co host Tony Newsome and I. If you're a fan of Star Trek, she just had a pretty amazing episode where she did a live action crossover on Strenging Worlds. I'm not she's not promoting it. I'm not I'm just saying I really liked it. But we have
been doing picket line like diaries. Essentially most of them start with me going fuck, funk funk, I'm running late. But yeah, just like literally, like what the vibe is on the ground at every year, we're gonna try to hit all the all the picket lines by the time this is over. But we started that way late. But it's been actually fun. Yeah. So yeah, just Yosi's racist. If if you could, if you find any of this remotely interesting, that would be cool.
Is there a work of media that you've been enjoying?
Yes, besides all the movies I talked about. Let's see the tweet I was looking for that I couldn't find, so I'll just have to attribute this to apocryphal and I don't remember paraphrasing, but it's basically somewhere on Strike News, basically some version of Hey, CBS, Sheldon ain't getting no younger. It's crazy that CBS in the old network, not like an old network, but Legacy TV is like, why are you fucking tanking your fall season just to support Netflix
on it? That's a different issue. But let's see Brian Brian Jordan Alvarez, but Brian Jor Alvarez on Twitter wrote, listen, we kind of killed this fucking pig. There's a spider nearby who keeps writing things in her web and they seem to be friends, which made me laugh this morning. So that that'll be my media.
There you go, Miles, Where can people find use their workI media you've been enjoying?
Oh, find me on where you go? Whatever?
You got them at Symbols at Miles of Gray. Also, you know, if you want to hear NBA talk, check out Jack and on Miles and jackott Man Boosti's check out my new true crime joint, The Good Thief, or we talk about the Greek Robinhood and also Force.
Uh some media I'm liking.
I thought I saw something over the weekend that I was fucking with.
Nah, forgot it. I forget about it already, don't worry about it.
Yeah, well, just just learn yourself, learn yourself, folks.
There you go. You can find me on Twitter at Jack Underscore O'Brien and on threads at Jack Underscore. Oh underscore, Brian, I've checked it in the past week, I swear to god. Working media has been enjoying it at Internet. Hippo tweeted every children, every American child has a Boston accent until they're about six years old. Science cannot explain this. You can find us on Twitter at daily Zeikeist. We're at
the Daily Zeicheist on Instagram. We have a Facebook fan page and a website Daily zeikeist dot com where we post our episodes and our footnotes. We're like off the information that we talked about in today's episode, as well as a song that we think you might enjoy. Mile's what song do we think people might enjoy?
Oh?
I think you're gonna enjoy this track? This from Surprise Chef. Gone out on the track from Surprise Chef before, but this is another track called Spikey Boy s p I K Y b o I and it's just like good instrumental. You know, Just relax and get your week started, lighthead nod. I will turn up the volume a little bit towards the end of the week and we'll probably go out on some wild out drum and.
Bass or some shit like that. But to start Spikey Boy by Surprise Chef.
All right, well, you can find that in the footnotes the Daily ze is the production of by heart Radio. For more podcasts from my heart Radio is the heart Radio, ap Apple podcast or wherever you listening to your favorite shows. That's gonna do it for us this morning, back this afternoon to tell you what is trending and we'll talk to you all then.
Bye bye