Does WWE employ union writers?

November 7, 2007 4:24 AM

Has WWE programming been affected by the WGA writers' strike?

I've read conflicting information about whether or not the writers employed to script promos and flesh out storylines on Raw and SmackDown! are members the Writers Guild.

Most of the news on wrestling 'news' sites is unconfirmed rumour, speculation or supposition, so I can't really trust their majority assertion that WWE's writers are non-union, even though many of the writers have a background in writing for soaps and other shows.

The content of Monday's Raw broadcast, to me, is strong evidence that the writers are indeed on the picket line. Over the course of 2 hours, only two main storylines were featured, which could easily have been handled by the wrestlers and bookers themselves (which was the done thing before writers were brought in a decade ago).

But that's just guesswork on my part. Can anyone here confirm either way?

posted by macdara to media & arts (4 comments total)

The WGA website lists WWE Films Development Inc. as a struck company, but not World Wrestling Entertainment Inc. Not conclusive...
posted by mzurer at 7:40 AM on November 7, 2007

In the opening sequence where DX was doing their thing, Triple H said something like, "The writers may be on strike, but we're not!" Also not conclusive...

It was a pretty crap episode, though.
posted by slenderloris at 8:28 AM on November 7, 2007

Meltzer sez they're not union, which is good enough for me unless he's, uh, proven wrong later. (It would surprise me a little if they were union, since the wrestlers themselves are non-union. Maybe some of them are members and some of them aren't? [If some of them are on strike, we'll be able to tell because they'll probably be humiliated on TV when they get back.])

In fact, he goes on to say that NBC may schedule more WWE programming to fill the holes in prime time.

But, yeah, trying to figure it out by judging the quality of the writing is a dodgy proposition at best.

Oh! Also -- one of the writers was on the show on Monday -- he's the big fat oily dancing guy. Um, I dunno what that means.
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 5:41 PM on November 7, 2007

Correction -- Meltzer says that the strike won't effect them -- not that none of the writers belong to a union. So there could be other reasons for it not effecting them -- because the strike doesn't effect "sports," or because the non-"writers" can pick up the slack. Hmm.
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 5:47 PM on November 7, 2007