WGA Kicks Off Pride Month with LGBTQ and Drag-Themed Pickets at WB and Netflix

A month into the writers' strike, the Writers Guild of America is keeping the resistance-fueled spirit of Pride alive on the picket lines.

The WGA's LGBTQ+ Writers Committee is kicking off Pride Month on Thursday with GLAAD as they lead the strike outside the Warner Bros. lot in Burbank and the Netflix headquarters in Manhattan for a "Pride on the Picket Line," one of several themed days taking place during the strike. 

"Good storytelling has been integral to the fight for LGBTQ acceptance," GLAAD wrote in an announcement last week. "We need writers to tell our stories. And they need to be fairly compensated."

WGA called a strike on May 1, following six weeks of negotiations with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP), the trade association representing Netflix, Amazon, Apple, Disney, Discovery-Warner, NBC Universal, Paramount and Sony.

"The companies' behavior has created a gig economy inside a union workforce, and their immovable stance in this negotiation has betrayed a commitment to further devaluing the profession of writing," WGA shared in a statement.

"From their refusal to guarantee any level of weekly employment in episodic television, to the creation of a 'day rate' in comedy variety, to their stonewalling on free work for screenwriters and on AI for all writers, they have closed the door on their labor force and opened the door to writing as an entirely freelance profession," the statement continued. "No such deal could ever be contemplated by this membership."

The Directors Guild of America is currently in negotiations with the AMPTP as SAG-AFTRA votes on whether to give negotiators strike authorization ahead of their own negotiations.