While members of SAG-AFTRA and the WGA took to the picket lines at Disney Studios on Tuesday, negotiations resumed between writers and producers for the first time in months. In a confidential location, studio executives held face-to-face discussions with the WGA’s negotiating committee. 

Among those present were David Zaslav from Warner Bros. Discovery, Robert Iger from Disney, and Ted Sarandos from Netflix.

The high-ranking executives aimed to break the deadlock by urging the writers to end the strike and presented what they considered a favorable deal – essentially calling it their final offer.

Approximately 20 minutes later, the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers issued a press release detailing their proposal from August 11th to the writers.

“This updated package significantly improves upon AMPTP’s previous proposals. It also includes groundbreaking offers for writers, featuring unprecedented terms in areas such as Generative Artificial Intelligence, data transparency, and minimum staffing,” the press release stated.

However, the writers are saying something different entirely about the meeting that took place. What they considered a small shred of hope that the strike might be able to come to an end was simply another bullying tactic by the AMPTP. 

In a statement made Tuesday, the WGA said, “On Monday of this week, we received an invitation to meet with Bob Iger [of Disney], Donna Langley [of Universal Pictures], Ted Sarandos [of Netflix], David Zaslav [of Warner Bros. Discovery], and Carol Lombardini [AMPTP’s president]. It was accompanied by a message that it was past time to end this strike and that the companies were finally ready to bargain a deal. We accepted that invitation and, in good faith, met tonight, in hopes that the companies were serious about getting the industry back to work. Instead, on the 113th day of the strike—and while SAG-AFTRA is walking the picket lines by our side—we were met with a lecture about how good their single and only counteroffer was.”

The studios’ claim that their counter offer involved a statement that they would not consider A.I. generated writing “literary material”. They also stated that they would place additional “guardrails” on A.I. material.

However, the WGA and SAG-AFTRA has said that their demands for a staff minimum within the writer’s room, as well as other needs, were brushed off. “We explained all the ways in which their counter’s limitations and loopholes and omissions failed to sufficiently protect writers from the existential threats that caused us to strike in the first place. We told them that a strike has a price, and that price is an answer to all—and not just some—of the problems they have created in the business. But this wasn’t a meeting to make a deal. This was a meeting to get us to cave, which is why, not twenty minutes after we left the meeting, the AMPTP released its summary of their proposals. This was the companies’ plan from the beginning—not to bargain, but to jam us. It is their only strategy—to bet that we will turn on each other.”