Barry Diller is an entertainment insider. He used to run Paramount movie studios and also worked for FOX.
During a recent appearance on Face the Nation, Diller said that if the writer and actor strike stretches on for too many months, it could cause the ‘collapse’ of Hollywood as we know it.
During the interview, he floats a possible fix for the problems causing the strike but notes that it probably wouldn’t be accepted.
He points out that the pandemic, combined with streaming has created a ‘perfect storm’ in this situation and if the strike goes beyond this fall, Hollywood is toast.
Breitbart News provides a partial transcript:
BRENNAN: You know, we were trying to gauge the economic impact of this. And according to the Milken Institute, it could cause $4 billion in economic damage. What do you think the impact will be? And how long will the strikes last?
DILLER: Well, the problem with this particular- all strikes get settled. The issue for this one is, is when. Because you have almost a perfect storm here, which is you had COVID, which sent people home to watch streaming and television and killed theaters. You- you’ve had the results of huge investments in streaming, which have produced all these losses for all these companies who are now kind of retrenching.
So, at this moment, this kind of perfect storm, it’s okay if it gets settled in the next month. But I’ll posit what happens if it doesn’t, and there doesn’t seem to be enough trust and energy to get it settled soon. What will happen is, if in fact, it doesn’t get settled until Christmas or so, then next year, there’s not going to be many programs for anybody to watch.
So, you’re gonna see subscriptions get pulled, which is going to reduce the revenue of all these movie companies, television companies, the result of which is that there will be no programs. And at just the time, strike is settled that you want to get back up, there won’t be enough money. So this actually will have devastating effects if it is not settled soon. And the problem with settlement in this case, is there’s no trust between the parties.
Watch the video below:
Won’t it be ironic if the striking actors and writers bring about the collapse of their own industry?
