FIRST OFF . . .

The Writers Guild of America says it will make available to TV stations around the country a 90-second “news video release” today stating what guild management feels were the salient points achieved by the 22-week strike against producers and TV networks. In the satellite-broadcast release a narrator says the new contract with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers “gives writers much of what they demanded,” and shows guild executive director Brian Walton telling viewers, “The story of this strike is the solidarity of the (guild’s) membership.” The video also shows guild members Casey Keller and Harlan Ellison hard at work at their new projects while the narrator intones, “The hard-fought strike also proves once again that every great drama in Hollywood begins and ends with the written word.” The point of the video, Walton said, is to deliver the guild’s message to Middle America: “Public opinion is important to writers. The public seldom sees the writer, but they’re our audience too.”