On Sunday, studios made a new offer — one reflecting improvements in some areas (health care) and scant movement in others (raises for streaming series) — and the unions on Monday afternoon made counteroffers
that held a hard line on multiple demands, according to three people briefed on the talks, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss private meetings.
Mr. Lindelof, whose credits include “The Leftovers,” “World War Z,”
and “Lost,” also gave credit to studio negotiators for “being true to their word in hearing our membership’s concerns about the dramatic shifts in the way our business now functions.”
Carol Lombardini, who led talks for the producers’ alliance, declined an interview request.
After breaking off on March 24 — each side blamed the other — Mr. Young
and his cohorts immediately ratcheted up the pressure, sending letters to TV advertisers promising a strike if no deal was reached by Monday and asking members to authorize a walkout.
Doug Creutz, an analyst at Cowen and Company, wrote in a research note
that the deal with writers was “positive” for media conglomerates, “as a strike invited several serious risk factors,” including “permanent acceleration of audience loss away from traditional TV and ad dollars from TV to digital.”
Eileen Conn, whose credits include the Disney Channel series “K.
With that single aggressively punctuated tweet, Phillip Iscove, a creator of the Fox drama “Sleepy Hollow,” summed up what Hollywood
writers seemed to be feeling on Tuesday, after a middle-of-the night deal between studios and writers to avert a strike.
