Unscripted Lives

Striking Television Writers Have Different Story Lines But None of Them Knows How This Chapter Will End

NEW YORK

Over the course of just a few months last year, Simon Rich went from college graduation to a job writing for "Saturday Night Live." A dream gig, particularly for a 23-year-old self-described "comedy nerd."

The dream, it turns out, lasted a mere 70 days. After working on a grand total of four episodes of the NBC show, Rich joined some 10,500 screenwriters of the Writers Guild of America in a strike against Hollywood's networks and movie studios.

Now, 12 weeks into the strike, he notes, "I have slightly more picketing experience than actual writing experience."

Rich still supports the WGA's goal of negotiating for increased home video residuals and a share of Internet revenues. But after the initial bursts of solidarity and enthusiasm for the walkout that began Nov. 5, he acknowledges a growing reality among the strikers: It's pretty dull being a TV writer who doesn't write TV shows. "I've watched a lot of Prince videos on YouTube," he says sardonically.

Other common themes among the writers: anxiety and apprehension. Writing for TV has never been steady work (the WGA says about half its West Coast members are unemployed at any time), but now nearly all of the guild's members have gone months without a paycheck. Many receive residuals for work they did months or even years earlier. But as the bills mount -- and living in New York or Los Angeles sure isn't cheap -- many worry about supporting themselves and their families.

An even bigger concern is that the strike might prompt the networks to cancel their scripted shows, or drop projects that haven't yet aired.

Bradford Winters, 36, was developing a new dramatic series for NBC about a multimillionaire financier and adventurer called "The Philanthropist." It was supposed to go into production soon and air next year. Now, he says: "It's on hold." Actually, "it's on serious hold." In the meantime, he's been working on a movie script and writing poetry. Winters isn't worried about his personal finances -- at least not yet. "I've been fortunate to be semi-regularly employed" for several years, "so I'm not about to end up on the street," he says. "But crunch time feels like it's coming."

It's still anyone's guess how long they'll have to keep walking. After more than a month of inaction, the studio-network alliance resumed informal talks with the WGA last week. But hopes for a quick settlement haven't been realized.

So the writers keep on not writing. Here are a few of them, picketing outside a midtown studio on a freezing afternoon this month.

The Showrunner

As a "showrunner," or a TV show's writer-producer, Warren Leight, 52, is responsible for just about everyone and everything on NBC's "Law & Order Criminal Intent." "If something's wrong," he says, "it's my fault."

The showrunners' support of writers is critical to the strike. If top creative people such as Leight remain off the job, it's highly unlikely that production on a series can resume.