Nick Counter Must Go: A Writer's Plea to the Studios

Read more strike coverage on the Huffington Post's writers' strike page.

There has never been a more galvanizing figure for the talent pool in Los Angeles than Nick Counter, the so-called chief negotiator for Big Media in the ongoing labor dispute with the Writers Guild of America. The collective distaste for this man among those picketing the studios and networks is so palpable that firing him alone could get these negotiations back on track before you can say "Alberto Gonzales" or "Donald Rumsfeld."

Like Gonzales and Rumsfeld before him, Nick Counter has come to personify the evil caricature of his employer. And the AMPTP is as sluggish and tone deaf in responding to the increasing hostility toward Mr. Counter as Bush was in removing Gonzales or Rumsfeld before their respective lightning rods had burned the house down.

A wise producer once said to me that the key to his success came down to one thing and one thing only: his ability and willingness to sublimate his ego for Talent. For the uninitiated, "talent" in Hollywood has two meanings (both don't always apply to the same person). Talent with a capital T generally refers to writers, directors, and actors.

What nobody seems to have told Mr. Counter is that, while he may be sitting across the table from the WGA's designated representatives to discuss issues that are all business, he's also speaking to Talent in the form of thousands of writers who don't often instinctively think about business first. On a daily basis they (we) think about things like: breaking a story, hearing dialogue, making it funny, or setting off the emotional land mine in the third act that we set up in the first. I can guarantee you that we're generally not thinking about percentages and profits and market share.

Contrary to what Mr. Counter would like you to think, the real bread and butter of our lives is not the money, it's the work. No writer chooses this profession to get rich. They choose it because they love it and because the only limit to their imagination is in imagining any other way to spend their lives.

We'll work eighty hours a week, spend years on a project we love, or turn something around in a just a few hours if that's what it takes. We'll work tirelessly and endlessly in a business that often seems designed to break one's heart, connecting the dots between paying jobs over months and years without work, and all we ask in return is that we be properly recognized and respected for the work we do.

In my experience, the people I've worked with at the studios have an innate understanding of this, and that includes the studio heads that we're currently striking against. But there is one person who clearly doesn't get it. There is one person who makes statements in the press that mock, disrespect, ridicule, and taunt us. That person is Nick Counter.

A strike is a war of wills. And wars end in one of three ways: one side is defeated, both sides are decimated, or everyone works to find a diplomatic solution. That third way is the only one for a community like ours, a community that needs each other like no other.

My plea to the AMPTP is to bring in a new representative, someone who understands that making an acceptable deal for all sides demands not just a negotiator but a diplomat.

Read more strike coverage on the Huffington Post's writers' strike page.

Comments

[JusticiaParaTodos]

Whether in a steel mill, construction site, hospital or TV network studio; bosses will always attempt to squeeze every ounce of labor from workers as cheap as they can.

What organized labor must learn is when a sister union is on strike, all unions in the motion picture and television industry should strike as well. A repeat of the 1981 Air Traffic Controllers fiasco should not be allowed to occur!

[dannyS]

This strike barely affects me. I only watch PBS and the Simpsons, but I also look to see what band is playing on Letterman.
Now Letterman is reruns every night. How does he feel about sitting at home? Does he have anything to say?

[TTigerX2]

ANNOUNCER: In this corner, Nick Counter, the goon from Big Media. In the far corner, Ann Coulter, unhinged proxy for the writers. We put 'em in a cage and watch 'em until somebody dies. Counter vs. Coulter. Tune in.

[AngerManagement]

It's very easy to focus our rage on Nick Counter, but he's only doing the studios' bidding. They picked him for a reason; he reflects their sensibilities.

[jcc173]

The Studio execs are Ronald Reagan, and the Writers are the Air Traffic Controllers. Look what has happened 25 years after the fact. Do you really think things can't get worse?

If it wasn't for the writer's the Actors would have nothing to say. So who is the real talent here?

[Pneumaticus]

Don't you love how some people's names fit their roles in life -- like bean counter, counterint­elligence, counterproductive, counteroffer, or even counterfeit.

[bick]

everybody keeps saying that the writers don't deserve anything because TV sucks. it sure does! but so does arby's, and the dude putting the sauce in your bag gets paid whether the food sucks or not. that's because he's WORKING. if you work, you get paid.

[wadenelson1]

Very well said.

[useyourbrain]

Writer's historically have been politically hit -- remember the Hollywood Ten (really the 19)? That witchhunt started as a way of shutting down the unions that were making noises after WWII and the Hollywood moguls got the attention of a California Legislative committee that investigated "Red" infiltration in the movie business. That was political, social and economic war that was declared on the talent in the business that didn't end until the mid 1960's.

The WGA was going to re-form itself before WWII broke out into the American Authors Authority that would cover all writers in all media (yet to be discovered -- the brilliant Lew Wasserman put into contracts starting in the 1940's). Writers would get 1% of the budget and revenue of everything they wrote. But this new incorporation was put on hold because of the war effort. And after the war -- the red scare and blacklist. Writers had to leave the country, families broke up, some committed suicide, men and women who couldn't do the work they loved -- the most tragic of it all. One can't even imagine the films we never got to see.

The writers should have waited a few months to strike just when the actors and directors did. I hope they hold out since whatever small gains they get, the actors and directors will build on that -- whatever the settlement, include a clause matching any settlement on DVD, internet (and any technologies yet to be developed) that they get.

It's about time the Writers got their due -- please don't cave. Look at your history, go to the archives, read the oral histories resurrect the American Authors Authority which the guild was about to change too but WWII came and then the Blacklist. Get back the author's copyright. History is repeating iself (and no residuals even).

[bigstreet]

Well said. But you're very generous about studio execs who wouldn't blink when it comes to firing writers and killing them daily by having their work rewritten. We all need each other, but lets never forget the culture in this industry is not and has never been writer friendly.