His first screenwriting credit appeared on theater screens less than a month ago, and his first TV series as writer-producer, Unhitched, is set for its debut on Fox early next year.
This should be a high point in Kevin Barnett's career. But instead, the Baltimore County native is getting ready to stop writing and go on strike tonight at midnight PST.
While negotiations between the Writers Guild of America and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers continue today, if a deal isn't reached, writing for TV and movies will grind to a halt.
After months of contentious talks, writers and their employers were unable to reach agreement on a new contract to replace the one that expired Wednesday. The dispute hinges on payments for DVDs and for shows distributed on the Internet.
Barnett, whose first movie, The Heartbreak Kid, opened Oct. 5, agrees that DVD payments should be increased and that writers deserve compensation regardless of how work is seen by an audience. But he's not happy about the prospect of going on strike.
"It just seems incredibly unfair," said Barnett, who is visiting his family in Timonium this weekend. "We've been fighting for such a long time, and [the issues] have just gotten patched over so many times. It seems like this [strike] is the only way to do it, unfortunately."
Should the writers walk out, the first audiences to feel the effect will be those watching late-night television and other live talk shows. Shows such as CBS' Late Night with David Letterman and NBC's The Tonight Show with Jay Leno could revert to reruns or go on hiatus.
In the last writers' strike, a five-month work stoppage in 1988, shows such as The Tonight Show stopped production for several months. Some talk shows did return before the strike was settled but with shorter monologues and longer interview segments.
Anticipating a strike, the networks sped up production on most prime-time shows, but those extra scripts are expected to run out by January or February. By then, TV viewers can expect more newsmagazine shows, game shows and other reality fare because those programs aren't covered by the WGA contract.
The effect on movies would take longer to show because films have a much longer turnaround time than television shows. Also, like the TV networks, studios have been hoarding scripts for months. Most of this summer's major releases, including Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, are well into production.
