I have to admit I was naive in originally supporting the Writers Guild Strike in a knee jerk reaction to stick it to the man. Then I saw the thousands upon thousands of people who work behind the scenes who are ALSO out of work who are not pulling down the ridiculous salaries we like to pay our celebrities. Behind every star on the walk of fame there are thousands of average joes working paid jobs who put him there.
So now I tip my hat to those very few celebs who want to put on a brave face and show respect to their striking writers (who I also respect and agree with mostly).
“During the 1988 writers strike, Johnny Carson reluctantly returned to ‘The Tonight Show’ without his writers after two months,” said NBC’s Executive Vice President for Late Night & Primetime Series, Rick Ludwin, in the statement. “Both Jay and Conan have supported their writers during the first two months of this WGA strike and will continue to support them. However, there are hundreds of people who will be able to return to work as a result of Jay’s and Conan’s decision.”
Hundreds of their staff members will be able to put food on their plates, pay their bills and carry on with their lives because these two had the balls to stand up for what is right and return to work. Giving their employees back their jobs.
Not surprising that if someone was crossing that line it would be these two. If I recall correctly, these guys were paying their staff even though they were not required at work.
Hopefully this will spawn others to return to work interim while a deal is being pounded out so that few others in the industry need to suffer the loss.
