Starting Tuesday, May 2, thousands of Hollywood writers will go on strike after contract negotiations failed between the studios and the Writers Guild of America. Like the previous strike in 2007-2008, the impact will be immediately felt on late night talk shows where new material needs to be written on the fly to react to current events. Jimmy Kimmel Live, The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon, Late Night with Seth Meyers, and others will go dark and start airing reruns until the strike is resolved.
According to Reuters, the next shows to be affected will be daytime soap operas “since they are traditionally written not long before they are filmed.” As for currently airing sitcoms, they should remain unaffected as their episodes are already written and filmed.
Meanwhile, streaming services, which have been a major source of contention leading to the strike, are relatively prepared to keep providing content until an agreement can be reached:
Netflix (NFLX.O), which makes shows around the world, has said it can feed its service with shows produced outside the United States. But its U.S.-based series would be affected if a strike drags on.
HBO Max, which is switching its name to Max in late May, has been saving up programming to release with its re-branding.
News shows will not be affected because those writers belong to a different union, and as we know from the 2007 strike, reality TV will also continue unimpeded.
(Via Reuters)