Writer's Guild of America East Attains New Deal With Producers of 'Colbert', 'Daily Show'

Deadline reports that the Writer's Guild of America, East has come to an agreement with Hello Doggies, Inc, the Production Company behind the cable hits  The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and the Stephen Colbert Report.  The negotiations involves details to its collective bargaining agreement with the Production Company and will significantly improve the methods used to calculate residuals paid to WGAE members for basic cable replays. Through the new agreement, it is estimated that beginning next year, there will be a 20% increase in residual payments, even with the recent decline in the number of replays which began this past September.

WGAE Executive Director and the union's chief negotiator Lowell Peterson commented yesterday, "It makes a real difference when Guild members are actively engaged in negotiations - and when the employer recognizes how integral writing is to the shows' success."

The new agreements were approved on Wednesday and Thursday of this week by members of the WGAE who work on The Daily Show and The Colbert Report.  Improvements had already been underway as a result of the  industry-wide Minimum Basic Agreement ("MBA") negotiated by the WGAE and the Writers Guild of America, West earlier this year. This latest agreement, which will extend to the year 2015, will afford increases to minimum compensation and increased contributions to the Producer-Writers Guild of America Pension Plan.