The honor of being chosen as your new president brings with it the opportunity of advocating on your behalf. I will help to anticipate changes, seize opportunities and shape our future. So, in this, my first column, I hope you'll find some inspiration from the Rambling ruminations of this Valley Girl.
I have been able to combine my very active career as a filmmaker with service to the Guild — representing our members on councils and committees, serving as your 1st Vice President on the National Board and co-chairing the Creative Rights Committee — for nearly two decades. During this time, I've participated in negotiations with the studios and networks and learned that the single most important role the DGA plays on behalf of directors is as protector of the right to create our vision.
As an example, one problem that emerged from the television side during these last negotiations was that of late script delivery in episodic TV. Studios now are well aware of the financial, creative and emotional cost on directors and the directorial team by not having a script in time to prep. The AD can't schedule, the UPM can't budget and the director can't truly contribute in a creative way to a show without a script. The financial impact to the companies of last-minute catch-up is huge, and the stress level to the directorial team, cast and crew is enormous.
An additional and equally troublesome by-product of late scripts is that series then have to rely on hiring only those directors already familiar with that show, allowing fewer opportunities for new directors, which seriously impacts women and minorities. You'll be reading more about this problem in the next issue of DGA Magazine.
What follows are the issues I have identified as priorities for the coming year:
- Protection of the director's ability to realize his or her vision — from the inception of an idea to the marketplace. We don't need to change the filmmaking process or alter the way in which a director works with studios, networks and producers to finish a project. But we do need to enforce the creative rights we have, to be aware of new technological developments, to employ them and to anticipate where new challenges may arise. We also must ensure that the director's vision is protected for the lifetime of his or her works and throughout all media, including TV, video, DVD, the internet and future delivery systems.
- Educating producers, showrunners, studio executives and our own members about the protections already in place. We also need to continue to get feedback from our members on new issues.
- Protection of the director's right to be properly credited for his or her work, including the right to seek a possessory credit. The ability of directors to negotiate for above-scale credit is part of our continuing campaign to ensure that directors are associated in the marketplace with their work.
- Protection of our members' rights to be properly compensated for the work they do including residuals and in ancillary markets.
- Protection of our members' ability to work. Along with our sister guilds, the studios and other organizations, we will continue to press for economic incentives to fight runaway production and bring work back home. Our DGA–PAC has been very active in this regard and, as you are aware, we are supporting both federal and state legislation aimed at keeping production in the United States.
- Vigilance in improving diversity in hiring. We will continue to challenge the networks and studios to provide more job opportunities for women and minorities.
I hope I can inspire more of you to get involved with the Guild in what ever way you can to help accomplish these goals.
I'd like to end by thanking former President Jack Shea for the outstanding job he did as our leader for the last five years and for staying on through our successful negotiations. Jack truly made a difference and we all owe him a debt of gratitude.
