It seems that way before the Great WGA Strike of 2007, there was a problem regarding screenwriting credits between George Clooney and the Writer’s Guild of America. Clooney, who’s upcoming movie Leatherheads was based on a 17-year-old script he came across, rewrote the script, almost completely from scratch. But for whatever reason, the WGA denied him a writing credit!

From Variety:

Aside from bringing back pro football’s formative days, “Leatherheads” might be remembered as the film that permanently drove a wedge between George Clooney and the Writers Guild of America.

Clooney went financial core last fall, after the WGA decided 2-1 in a credit arbitration vote that only Duncan Brantley and Rick Reilly deserved screen credit on the picture that Universal opens today.

Going fi-core means a member is still technically a member of the WGA, but has limited rights within the guild. Fi-core members have to pay dues and are covered by the health and pension plans. Once you elect to go fi-core, the decision is irreversible.

“When your own union doesn’t back what you’ve done, the only honorable thing to do is not participate,” said Clooney, who stressed he made no attempt to exclude Brantley and Reilly.

Clooney says he would have quit the WGA altogether if he could, but that would have prevented him from working on all WGA-covered productions. He says he wanted nothing more to do with the WGA but didn’t want to be hampered in his ability in writing scripts.

As for “Leatherheads,” Clooney took a languishing 17-year old project and got a greenlight after personally giving the script a major overhaul that transformed it into a screwball comedy. He says he felt he’d written all but two of the film’s scenes.

While he agreed that Brantley and Reilly deserved first position credit for hatching the idea and characters, he was incensed enough by the WGA arbitration process to go financial core, which rendered him a dues-paying non-voting member.

The WGA had no comment about Clooney’s decision.

Clooney didn’t appeal the WGA ruling, and kept his action quiet because the WGA was gearing up for a strike at the time. He didn’t want the filing seen as him having split ranks with the union over the labor dispute.

Clooney has been a vocal advocate for urging studios and unions to resolve their differences as soon as possible; he joined Tom Hanks, Sally Field and others at a testy February meeting with SAG leaders in order to urge the guild to start bargaining ASAP.

To Grant Heslov, who partners with Clooney in the production shingle Smoke House, and who was a producer with Clooney on “Leatherheads,” the fi-core move was simply a reaction to a bad WGA decision.

“This script that Duncan and Rick wrote sat languid until after we finished ‘Good Night, and Good Luck’ and George wanted to do something lighter,” Heslov said. “George liked ‘Leatherheads,’ but said it never felt quite right. He took it to Italy with him, and I remember when he called to say he thought he’d solved it. One thing that you clearly see, if you read the original, the subsequent drafts and then his draft, is that he wrote the majority of the film. When I got the call about the decision that he wasn’t getting credit, I was shocked. We both thought Duncan and Rick would get first position credit, which they deserved. But this wasn’t right.”

WGA requires directors who seek writing credit to be responsible for 50% of the script. Heslov said Clooney kept his displeasure quiet because he didn’t want to be viewed as a credit hog since, after all, he is the star, director and a producer of “Leatherheads.” But Clooney confirmed his exit to Daily Variety.

Heslov said this wasn’t about ego, pointing out that when Universal sent a notice that the film would bear the credit “A George Clooney Film,” Clooney nixed it. And while Clooney and Heslov shared an Oscar nomination for original screenplay on “Good Night, and Good Luck,” Clooney and ex-partner Steven Soderbergh removed their names from the producer roster, leaving Heslov the sole nominee when the Clooney-directed pic became a best picture candidate.

“He doesn’t take possessory credit because he believes this is a collaborative business and he’s not a guy who needs credit,” Heslov said. “Financial core was his form of protest, but when he did it, he didn’t want it public. We’re both big union guys. Between us, we belong to 12 unions. I think they made the wrong decision, and he was within his rights to respond by going financial core.”

By going fi-core, writers withhold the portion of dues spent by the WGA on non-contract activities — while still being able to write scripts. Fi-core writers pay dues that are 1.9% less than regular members; they also can’t vote on contracts or in any WGA election.

Under WGA rules, if the director or producer of a film is proposed for final credit, an automatic arbitration is triggered.

This is really quite interesting; the whole basis, the very foundation, of the WGA is to give credit where credit is due. And here we have George Clooney, having rewritten practically an entire script, getting NO credit whatsoever. AND, to put salt in the wound, Clooney’s protest (going Fi-Core) is weak at best; the ultimate protest would’ve been to quit the WGA altogether, but unfortunately, if he ever wants to write another movie for a major studio, he is FORCED to remain part of the WGA.

And they say the Mafia doesn’t exist…

Now that the WGA is officially back behind their desks (it wasn’t officially until last night), NBC and the Hollywood Foreign Press may be eyeballing a lawsuit against them. According to Nikki Finke, the two are bitter about the writer’s strike having forced the Golden Globes to become nothing more than a glorified press conference, as opposed to a glorified, televised revenue-generating ass-kissing ceremony of years past.

It’ll be interesting to see what their legal grounds are. I mean, they still had a Golden Globes ceremony, so they can’t say they didn’t get to have that. And I hardly think they can sue because the ceremony wasn’t as grand as before. The only legal ground I can think of is that they’ll sue for loss of profits from ad revenue. Which would just make NBC and HFPA look like even bigger assholes than before.

Not quite.

This week alone, Hollywood studios have been slapped with THREE humongous lawsuits (more like 2 big ones and one mediocre, but publicity-worthy).

First up is New Line Cinema, which has barely settled their lawsuit with director Peter Jackson mere weeks ago over the Lord of the Rings trilogy (he sued New Line because he claimed they weren’t giving him all the back-end points they agreed on) and is now facing a pseudo-shut down as it may be possibly folded into its parent company Warner Bros (folded meaning everything belonging to New Line will become WB property and the New Line name will be dropped). Now the estate of Rings creator J.R.R. Tolkien is suing New Line because they’re claiming they haven’t received ANY profit-participation money from the trilogy, which grossed almost $3 billion worldwide.

Second: Jew-hating Mel Gibson is being sued by his own writer, Benedict Fitzgerald, who wrote the screenplay for The Passion of the Christ. Fizgerald is claiming that Gibson had made him take a lower wage and less profit points on The Passion because it was going to be a low-budget picture. This lawsuit may go by the wayside, as I think it’ll turn out to simply be a matter of the writer wanting more money because the movie turned out to be a bigger hit than anyone expected.

Now for the one that may cause some serious problems for a movie that’s not even finished yet: 20th Century Fox is suing Warner Bros. over the rights to the upcoming comic adaptation Watchmen (directed by 300’s Zack Snyder). Fox is claiming that they have the exclusive distribution rights for Watchmen, which is currently being produced (and slated for distribution) by WB. Fox claims they had ALL movie rights to Watchmen in the early 90s but (for some reason) gave all but the distribution rights up.

What doesn’t make sense in this lawsuit (for me at least) is that the Watchmen comic book is a DC Comics property… and DC Comics is owned by Warner Bros. Since the beginning of time, only WB has produced (and distributed) movies based on DC books, so what doesn’t make sense to me is why Fox would have the rights to Watchmen.

I was surprised this morning to discover that the Writer’s Guild struck a deal with United Artists (the studio headed by Tom Cruise and his producing partner Paula Wagner) that will allow the studio to develop screenplays during the writer’s strike.

This is all part of the WGA’s new “divide and conquer” strategy (as explained by Nikki Finke), which resulted in David Letterman and Craig Ferguson getting to use writers on their talk shows, while others like Conan O’Brien and Jimmy Kimmel have to improvise everything. The WGA is hoping that by making deals with individual companies, the AMPTP will be forced to concede to the WGA’s demands.

Although the UA deal is only the 2nd of its kind (and UA is technically a very tiny studio… the actual impact is questionable), it’s clear that the WGA’s negotiations with individual companies are working. What makes it a blow for AMPTP’s cause is that United Artists agreed to the exact demands that the WGA put on the table for AMPTP, which amounts to a “if UA can do it, AMPTP can” scenario. Plus, it’s a win-win for United Artists, because if the WGA and AMPTP resolve their issues and end up with lesser demands, the UA can (and will) cancel their interim agreement and take part in the lesser deal.

However, the question now is, what was the motivation behind the deals? Is it an honest desire to agree with the WGA’s demands, or is it a desperate need to resume work? While Letterman’s Worldwide Pants is a pretty successful company, I don’t believe it’s big; aside from producing Letterman and Ferguson’s shows, it makes one, maybe two, other television shows each year (it used to produce Everybody Loves Raymond).

United Artist may in fact be smaller than Worldwide Pants. Since its rebirth in 2006, its only output so far was the financial and critical bomb Lions for Lambs, and its next release, the Bryan Singer-helmed Valkyrie, has been getting some negative press and has in fact just been pushed from a summer release to winter, which is never a good sign. According to IMDB, it only has 2 other projects lined up, neither of which are on anyone’s radar.

Is the WGA trying to hit the smaller companies first? Did UA go to WGA first, or vice-versa? These and so many other questions need to be answered before we can understand whether WGA’s divide-and-conquer strategy is actually working, before it’s too late.

Today the Los Angeles Times posted an email from a key grip… sorry, EX-key grip of NBC’s The Office.

“Our show was shut down and we were all laid off this week. I’ve been watching the news since the WGA strike was announced and I have yet to see any coverage dedicated to the effect that this strike will have on the below the line employees.

I respect the WGA’s position. They probably do deserve a larger percentage of profit participation, but a lengthy strike will affect more than just the writers and studios. On my show we had 14 writers. There were also 2 cameramen, 2 camera assistants, 4 hair stylists, 4 makeup artists, 7 wardrobe people, 4 grips, 4 electricians, 2 craft service, 4 props people, 6 construction, 1 medic, 3 art department, 5 set dressers, 3 sound men, 3 stand-ins, 2 set PAs, 4 assistant directors, 1 DGA trainee, 1 unit manager, 6 production office personnel, 3 casting people, 4 writers assistants, 1 script supervisor, 2 editors, 2 editors assistants, 3 post production personnel, 1 facilities manager, 8 drivers, 2 location managers, 3 accountants, 4 caterers and a producer who’s not a writer. All 102 of us are now out of work.

I have been in the motion picture business for 33 years and have survived three major strikes. None of which have been by any of the below the line unions. During the 1988 WGA strike many of my friends lost their homes, cars and even spouses. Many actors are publicly backing the writers, some have even said that they would find a way to help pay bills for the striking writers. When the networks run out of new shows and they air repeats the writers will be paid residuals. The lowest paid writer in television makes roughly twice the salary than the below the line crewmember makes. Everyone should be paid their fair share, but does it have to be at the expense of the other 90% of the crewmembers. Nobody ever recoups from a strike, lost wages are just that, lost.

We all know that the strike will be resolved. Eventually both sides will return to the bargaining table and make a deal. The only uncertainty is how many of our houses, livelihoods, college educations and retirement funds will pay for it.”

The “the strike will be resolved” statement has been spewed over and over by hundreds of people. Everyone “hopes for the best.” Well, I’m not seeing anything being done to solve it. I understand the point of going on strike is to show the big wigs that the company suffers without their employees, but shouldn’t the point of having a union rep you be that they negotiate with the companies?? Nobody’s fucking negotiating! All I see is a bunch of grown people acting like babies throwing a tantrum.

Interesting bit of news from the only source I need to keep me up on the WGA strike, DeadlineHollywoodDaily It seems that NBC is firing the “non-writing” staff on the show (unless I’m mistaken you can’t fire someone who’s on strike?) at the end of next week. Yes, that’s right, the non-writing staff of The Tonight Show is getting canned the week before Thanksgiving. To make matters more interesting, since Leno won’t cross the picket line, NBC will be bringing in guests hosts to take his place.

I find it interesting not as a strike-related matter but because recently there’s been friction between Jay Leno and NBC, being that Leno is having second thoughts about retiring (he’s contractually obligated to quit in a few years so NBC can give his show to Conan O’Brien). NBC keeping the show going on without Leno is very much like telling him, “We don’t need you, you big chinned freak.”

(Update: rumors are indicating the agency cutting pay is ICM, a truly major H’wood agency)

There’s already another victim on the chopping block: live television. Shows like The Daily Show are already announcing they’ll be going into reruns for the duration of the strike since their writers won’t be working anymore. Some shows like The Late Show and The Tonight Show haven’t said anything about reruns, but how long can they last without writers?