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The Writers Guild, West, is considering bringing a lawsuit to protect its First Amendment rights. And I think every Hollywood guild member should boycott this hell-hole of a shopping mall that houses the Oscars. That's because a group of WGAW staffers were subjected to “citizen’s arrest” Thursday morning at the Hollywood & Highland complex. At about 9:00 A.M. Thursday, Hollywood & Highland Center security guards abruptly surrounded, detained, and handcuffed WGAW guild organizers Laura Watson (see photo left) and Terence Long, and Assistant Executive Director Jeff Hermanson (see photo below). So what were the activists doing to get themselves hauled off? Simply passing out leaflets during American Idol's week of Hollywood auditions there and informing the public that “FremantleMedia refuses to treat its writers fairly”.
The WGAW insists they did not interfere with or obstruct the shopping mall’s operations or the activities of FremantleMedia. But the guild members were turned over to the LAPD, and later released after posting bond. Writers Guild General Counsel Tony Segall said the guild was considering legal action against the operators of the Hollywood & Highland Center for false arrest. The California Supreme Court has held that the state constitution guarantees the right of expression of ideas in shopping malls on the grounds that they're the contemporary equivalent of the town square. The WGAW notes that other labor unions and community groups have held public actions such as leafleting and picketing inside the Hollywood & Highland shopping complex without incident. (Photo below of leafleting at the mall)
Thursday's protest was part of the WGA's ongoing campaign of rallies, briefings, and a nationwide tour to bring attention to what the guild claims are "the substandard industry practices" of American Idol producer FremantleMedia. The American Idol Truth Tour shadowed AI auditions this past summer in several major U.S. cities -- including San Francisco, New York, Phoenix, and San Juan, Puerto Rico -- to demand that FremantleMedia provide its writers and other workers with industry standard pay and benefits. But yesterday was the first time American Idol Truth Tour participants had been arrested. “We will continue to exercise our First Amendment rights despite the heavy-handed treatment we received,” said the WGAW's Hermanson. “The public has a right to know that the top-rated show on television does not provide their writers with basic necessities like health care.”
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They’re lucky they’re not in Colombia. They would disappear.
“I can hire one half of the working class to kill the other half.”
Jay Gould, 19th century robber baron
Perversely, if the Hollywood and Highland complex has a single owner, it may be exempt from the First Amendment’s provision that a shopping mall is a place of common gathering regardless of how many stores rent there. This is why Trader Joe’s in SoCal is allowed to ban petition gatherers. That notwithstanding, the Hollywood and Highland complex is still an abomination architecturally, commercially, and traffic-wise. But I digress.
Absolutely spot on, Nikki. The Highland Center is the most sterile, rotten piece of shit “shopping” complex on the face of the planet. It still pains me that the Oscars are held there. A complete and total embarrassment. More importantly is the shredding of the Constitution by the private security force there. The WGA has the American right to hand out flyers, for Christ sake!I say this would make one hell of a publicity-thick lawsuit, don’t you?
Doesn’t Brando’s Ghost have better things to do than cuff & stuff people for doing the ‘write’ thing… Take your posse back to The Island of Dr. Moreau.
Wah-wah…
Viva la Revolucion!
On Monday, the WGA should file a hundred million dollar lawsuit against Hollywood and Highland for false arrest. The WGA should also organize a huge protest for Monday calling on all Guild members and members of all our sister unions to turn out strong to picket this violation of our constitutional rights. I want to see a thousand people carrying “Hollywood & Highland Hates Hollywood” signs. In this teetering economy where the retail industry is already on the ropes, let’s push that dump into bankruptcy and scare the shit out of its tenants. Plus, we should involve the AMPAS in this and make them tell this glorified flea market that such actions won’t be tolerated at the home of the Oscars. And if they don’t respond, we picket the Oscars. They have given us a huge opening here with their ill-conceived idiocy; we need to take advantage of it.
What exactly do these writers on AI… write? It’s just Ryan seacrest announcing the next performer. A monkey could write “(Contestant name) you are safe. You made the top 12.”
Plus, no matter what you say, that tourist trap of a mall is private property. They were asked to cut it out and refused so the security took the next step.
TSZ give me a break you idiot. At least take a look at Wikipedia before you spout off your right-wing bullshit about “private property.”
Pretty much everything is scripted including the live results shows. I am sure that Simon, Paula, and Randy have their own writer so that they can write their “reactions” to the performances before they “officially” see and hear the performances on live TV. In other words, the judges attend rehearsal. Also, the taped auditions and hollywood round are so scripted that in a few weeks the producers will know who the final 24 contestants are and the writers will be writing Ryan’s voiceovers as the show is edited for television.
One other thing, the auditions are also scripted because there is a panel that screens auditions before they go before the judges. The judges are told what to expect and their writers are likely in an adjoining room telling them what to expect.
As for that results show, I am sure that is scripted as well because the producers and writers know the results beforehand and it is the writers that make up the little games that Ryan sometimes plays, and the segments that have nothing to do with the results or singing in any results show including the season finale are clearly written by the writers. To say that they don’t deserve WGA representation is like saying that 19 Arab kooks with boxcutters managed to bring down the World Trade Center and part of the Pentagon, or that Saddam had WMD’s in 2003’s Iraq before the US invaded.
Now if you expand that to the entire Reality TV and Game Show universe, the only thing unscripted about it is the Real World Show on MTV, the base tribal interactions on Survivor, and the episode’s vote on that very same show. Even if Mark Burnett employes no writers, Jeff Probst is still a writer and deserves WGA membership because he has to come up with the introductions to each episode, tell the tribes about their challenges, and address them from time to time including Tribal Council and he is very good at his job.
For the most part, I agree with everybody here saying that the WGA should file a lawsuit regarding the treatment their representives got today. I am all for citizen’s arrest, but let’s limit it to the Bozos in Washington. As the great Stephen Colbert once said, “They know what they did.”
Unions are stupid. If the writers for American Idol don’t think they are paid enough – and really how much can they be worth, really – why don’t they go work somewhere else with their great writing skills?
Unions kill jobs.
Fremantle crossed the line. The WGA membership needs to unite against these pricks. When they hit one of us, or in this case several of us, they hit ALL of us. I want to see the same unity and outrage against them as there was against Tyler Perry. Fremantle is trampling on writers and the membership needs to rise up and support their fellow scribes against the greedy machine known as Fremantle. They pay Simon Cowell 5o million a year but they can’t pay a couple of grand to make sure their writers have f-ing health insurance? Gimme a break. We need to send them a loud and clear message that this kind of shite will not be tolerated!
Dear Unions are Stupid,
Yeah, let’s go back to the 1920s; I hope your employer starts paying you in company scrip, you scumbag.
Not to be a total jerk but I mean come on. The WGA is creating a horrible image for themselves. I think they have taken on the mentality of “We are unhappy, lets just picket.” In my opinion they sound like a bunch of whiners. We get it… you don’t get paid enough. I work in the business and I don’t get paid enough either but if you truly love this business and town it is not about the money. Go home and write for the Springfield Daily News.
I don’t always agree with the guild’s leadership. I have zero respect for their negotiating ability – IN THE FUTURE, PLEASE HIRE PEOPLE THAT KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING. I thought conducting any reality-related demonstration/protest/awareness activity shortly after so easily surrendering that demand in the strike was a joke.
But having people arrested (or even attempting to have people arrested) for just passing out sh!t is ridiculous.
What exactly is the charge here? Trespassing? Give me a frickin’ break. If you want to remove people that annoy you, how about the frickin’ costume characters all over the place?
But whether it’s arresting WGA activists or annoying people in costumes, it’s the same jackassery.
One of the great things about a free society should be that people can be mildly annoying to you (as long as they don’t physically interfere with you or your freedom of movement) without fear of arrest.
Very communist China-like, H&H. I hope the recession hits the CIM Group particularly hard.
WGA members should be smart enough not to confer police powers to a mall guard just because he is wearing black, is bald and has a strange morphology.
These guards did not have any more of a right to put their hands on you than any of the people you handed fliers to. Challenge the “citizen’s arrests”… say things like, “put your hands on her and you will get sued, do you understand.” If they want you to leave, leave, but keep the Fifes afraid of using handcuffs by warning them that you know your rights and that they need to back down and let you leave. That is just sad that smart writers let dumbbell guards cuff them.
“I work in the business and I don’t get paid enough either but if you truly love this business and town it is not about the money.”
That sounds like the sort of rationale cult leaders use to keep their followers from questioning their beliefs. “If you have enough faith, then it doesn’t matter that nothing we teach you makes sense.”
Stop drinking the Kool-Aid.
Why not signs outside the auditions, simply asking…
“Why do Simon, Paula, Randy, and Ryan hate America’s union workers?”
Fremantle and Hollywood & Highlands actions in this instance do seem a bit fascist.
Corporate control of the police is a concern for all citizens.
Freedom of speech is stifled in the state of creative expression.
Why not arrest every single person who’s hawking something (product or idea) at H&H? The scruffy dude shoving his made from a laptop music CD in front of the Virgin Mega store, the pushy kids shoving samples of products I won’t ever use, the annoying walking characters in front of the H&H entrance. Hell, why not just arrest the Salvation Army bell ringer this season?
I will NEVER go back to H&H when I visit LA again.
File your lawsuit WGA! I’ll stand by you.
Fremantle thinks they can bully the WGA the same way they do their employees. They have writers on ALL of their shows and they lie about it because they think people will just believe that lie.
The guild is at a crossroads here. Wake up membership, your people have been arrested by a big greedy company that thinks it can do whatever it wnts in Hollywood with impunity. This is all out war and every guild member should be outraged. Let’s hope the same list of showrunners who declared their anger about Tyler Perry’s despicable treatment of writers will once again stand up, unite the membership, and fire back at Fremantle North America. Arrested for passing out leaflets? Gimme a break. Freedom of speech has just been put in the shredder.
I guess the WGA Christmas party on December 7th will be a really fun event this year.
Where’s it being held, you ask?
Rise Restaurant…located in the The Hollywood & Highland Complex.
All those attending, be sure to bring cards, gifts and bail money.
How much are we paying those three staffers to stand out there and do a job that you can hire a guy from in front of Home Depot to do for 3 bucks an hour?
What a great use of resources. Enforcement of the MBA is a joke, getting late/short residuals collected is not a priority… but we’re paying three people to hand out photocopies that everyone drops in the trash three seconds later.
I’m only upset that they let them out of jail.
Fremantle owns the mall now? How are they responsible?
Give the behavior of WGA members when they were striking, I wouldn’t be shocked if they were disruptive. Let’s not crucify H&H until we hear the other side of the story.
If it is so unfair, find a new job.
I’m sorry your husband lost the election, Cindy. Get over it. Don’t let the anger and resentment build up too much. It’s not healthy. To suggest that people who are being treated unfairly and not paid what they are worth by Freemantle don’t have the right to speak up for their rights is ridiculous. And mean! Everyone, even you Cindy, has the right to speak up and speak out if they feel they are not being treated fairly and they are not being fairly compensated for their work.
Unhappy with the WGA wrote:
>can hire a guy from in front of Home Depot to do for >3 bucks an hour?
Is that how much Fremantle is paying you to be their shill here? Figures, that’s about how much they pay their writers.
“Is that how much Fremantle is paying you to be their shill here? Figures, that’s about how much they pay their writers.”
If that’s the best you can do, I can see why you’re worried about salaries on reality shows. You’d be lucky to get a job writing for one.
Clem, the guards at H&H have the authority to perform a Citizen’s Arrest through the State of California when they get their State certification. So, you go ahead and threaten them with a lawsuit and they’ll happily cuff you anyway and call the LAPD to cart your ass away.
In fact, all it takes is for one patron of the mall to complain about the people handing out the flyers, and the guards can act on it. And all it takes is for one protester to mouth off and be an asshole for the guards to make the decision to go from ‘please leave the premises’ to ‘assume the position’.
Leeroy, I come from a family of lawyers and you don’t know what kind of Hell you’d live through cuffing me for handing out fliers. Sorry, you don’t know what your talking about.
Security guard companies are mandated by the state to carry huge liability insurance bonds because their Fifes get so royally sued every time they tackle or “take someone down.”
I am not a triple poster type of person, but Leeroy, you need help understanding something… when you write, and I quote “the guards at H&H have the authority to perform a Citizen’s Arrest through the State of California when they get their State certification” you must, for your own good, come to understand that they do not actually need to be certified to do that and are conferred any additional powers whatsoever through that certification as it comes to arresting people. Do you understand? A “Citizen’s Arrest” is an arrest conducted by a citizen and ALL citizens have that right automatically without any need for certification. The REASON you get certified is not to confer power, it is so that the state and the guard company have provided a modicum of screening to make sure, as best they can, that the guard understands he is not a cop and cannot tackle people. It is a certification of admission that you do not have power not a certification that you have new power. It is for liability. So, now, do you understand why lawyers get so excited when people call them who have been mistreated by Mall Fifes?
Yes, Clem. I understand. Do you?
As I recall, the Hollywood & Highland mall was built with taxpayer money and tax incentives provided to the developers. The City of LA still runs the parking lot. This is not a private enterprise and Freemantle is not privileged to circumvent the 1st Amendment. As Simon would say, “What the bloody hell was that?”
How come only “WGA Staffers” were arrested? Where were the WGA Members or Reality Writers?
The problem with this effort has always been that the WGA wants it more then the reality writers, until that changes, well nothing else will either.
Someone needs to let Hollywood and Highland know that the Bush Era of Fascism is over. Sue the motherfuckers.
Bush era of fascism? Last I checked Hollywood was 100% in the bag for Obama.
And these strategies worked so well for ATNM. Please. The WGA’s hardcore members don’t care two hoots in hell about the reality writers. That the “leadership” thinks that they can enlarge the union rolls by making reality a fiefdom is a pipe dream.