Tag: WGA

Joan Rivers About To Get Kicked Out of Writers Guild For “Scabbing”

July 12, 2014 - Activists, David Feldman Radio Show, David Feldman Show, Most Recent, Our Radio Shows

Once again Joan River is in danger of being kicked out of the Writers Guild.

Under Deal Made With Guild in 2013 Rivers Promised to Stop Writing During Strike, But Rivers Continues To Write Violating Union Rules

Joan Rivers could face expulsion from the Writers Guild of America for failure to stop writing on a television show that writers are currently striking. That show, according to a union official, is E’s “Fashion Police” hosted by Rivers. Before going on strike Rivers’ writers were earning $610.00 a week with no health insurance. Their strike against E’s “Fashion Police” continues while Rivers violates union rules by writing on the show.

Rivers’ troubles with the union started back in October of 2013 after the Writers Guild scheduled a disciplinary hearing to determine if Rivers should be expelled for scabbing. Right before that hearing was to take place an embarrassed Rivers assured the Guild that she would stop writing and support her writers in their efforts to join the very same union she has been a member of for decades. Now once again she could get kicked out of it.

According to an interview on Pacifica Radio with Melodie Shaw, field representative and organizer for The Writers Guild of America West, Rivers has broken her promises to the union and has even given interviews calling her writers “idiots” and “schmucks” for organizing.

Shaw added that Rivers verbally abused the writers on E’s Fashion Police after they approached her about joining the union.

Listen:

Joan Rivers “Not a Nice Person,” Says Hollywood Union Official

July 10, 2014 - David Feldman Show, The News From Around The World, Top Stories

http://youtu.be/YsQgsQJmmgQ

Joan Rivers is not a nice a person according to a spokesperson for the Writers Guild of America. Melodie Shaw, field representative and organizer for The Writers Guild of America West, said that Rivers verbally abused the writers on E’s Fashion Police after they approached her about joining a union. Shaw said this during an interview airing Friday on Pacifica Radio’s David Feldman Show.

Shaw said the Fashion Police writers were earning $610 a week without health insurance. In 2013 they decided it was time to go union after two other E comedy programs, hosted by Chelsea Handler and Joel McHale, joined the WGA (Writers Guild of America). Shaw said those two programs went union, “in no small measure due to Handler and McHale supporting their writers every step of the way.”

Shaw said Rivers, a member of the WGA for several decades, “turned on her writers” during a meeting “hurling expletives” and then storming out when they told her they couldn’t live on $610 a week without health insurance.

In response to Rivers’ failure to assist them in joining the WGA, Fashion Police writers approached the union on their own, and then staged a walkout. Shaw said Rivers, a WGA member, continued to work despite the walkout which is a violation of union rules. This prompted the WGA to schedule a disciplinary hearing to determine whether they would revoke Rivers’ union membership. In October of 2013, right before her hearing was to be held, an apologetic Rivers contacted the WGA and promised she would support her writers and help them get a union contract. Shaw said that based on those assurances the WGA immediately cancelled Rivers’ disciplinary hearing.

Fashion Police writers voted unanimously to join the union in December of 2013. Under federal law Fashion Police was then required to negotiate with the WGA. Shaw said since that vote Rivers has not negotiated in good faith, rarely returning calls from the union and offering her writers a contract way below union standards. Shaw said Rivers even went so low as to tell the press that her writers were “schmucks” and “idiots” for organizing.

When asked if Rivers had been kicked out of the Writers Guild, Shaw said not yet because the WGA is still hoping they can cut a deal with E’s Fashion Police.

Shaw was a guest on the David Feldman Show broadcast nationwide on Pacifica Radio and available as a podcast on iTunes. Feldman said he invited Shaw on his program after watching Rivers grow hostile and storm off the set during a CNN interview earlier in the week after the host asked if she was “mean.”

“It seems to me,” said Feldman, “that how you treat your employees is a pretty good barometer of whether or not you’re cruel. $610 a week with no health insurance? That seems pretty cruel to me.”

Feldman began the interview by asking Shaw if Joan Rivers was mean. Shaw responded, “Yes.”

Listen here:

Joan Rivers’s Not So Secret Shame

May 25, 2013 - Top Stories

Without writers nothing comes out of that hole.

There is power in the union. Ned Rice writes for our show and he is one of the leaders of the strike. He talked about this on our radio show last month. From The Wrap…

Nine of the 12 Los Angeles-based writers for “Fashion Police” have been on strike since April 17, protesting what they see as E!’s unfair labor practices and violations of California wage and hour law.

I wonder who the three writers are who haven’t joined the strike…

Writers on the highly rated show, who lack health care and pension benefits, are demanding to be covered by a Writer’s Guild of America West contract.

Wisconsin, Why It Matters

June 5, 2012 - Most Recent, Our Podcast

Originally Broadcast June 5, 2012. Howie Klein is the founder and treasurer of Act Blue the Political Action Committee that supports progressive causes. He also writes daily for Down With Tyranny and is a frequent contributor to Crooks And Liars. Howie is perhaps best known for his role as President of Reprise Records from 1989 to 2001. He is also an adjunct professor of music at McGill University in Montreal, where he sometimes lectures. Along with Kevin Rooney and Rick Overton. Portions of today’s program were written by Ben Zelevansky.

The David Feldman Show