Dispatches From The Picket Lines Day 38: A Bike Strike & A ‘Daisy Jones’ Listening Party

It was musical Monday for WGA picketers on day 56 of the Writers Guild strike, with Death Row Records representing in front of Sunset Bronson Studios, site of one of Netflix’s many Los Angeles-based offices.

Sam Claflin learned about the history of Fleetwood Mac from a TikTok video.

Spike Lee was not on the speakers list at a rally Thursday morning for striking film and television writers outside City Hall in New York. But one of the Brooklyn-born filmmaker’s best-loved movies, 1989’s Do the Right Thing, kept cropping up as local elected officials took turns calling for studio executives to resume negotiations with the Writers Guild of America and help end a strike now in its eighth week.

Michael Schneider Variety Editor at Large We’ve all made the “Cop Rock” jokes. The Steven Bochco musical drama, which premiered in fall 1990, was a big swing: marrying original music with procedural storytelling. It was a colossal flop that we still talk about three decades later, and a reminder that musicals are hard. Music has been a part of the TV landscape going back to the 1950s and shows like “Your Hit Parade.” But few series have successfully integrated regular music performances into their storytelling: “The Monkees” and “The Partridge Family” worked in the 1960s and ’70s. “Fame” did it in the early ’80s. And then “Cop Rock” scared people off the concept.

It was a busy day on the L.A.-area WGA picket lines, with a visit from some Abbott Elementary folks, support from unionized teachers and nurses, and dancers getting their hula on for Pacific Islander Day.

Priscilla Presley says all is well in her family.

It’s safe to say that today’s picket line at Warner Bros in Burbank drew a little more attention than some other days. That’s because newly unionized strippers from North Hollywood turned out to support striking WGA writers — and they brought a pole along.

Riley Keough is reportedly paying her grandmother, Priscilla Presley, $1 million in order to settle the lawsuit over control of the estate of Lisa Marie Presley, who died in January at age 54.

Lisa Marie Presley’s estate has come to an end, with Riley Keough being named as the sole trustee.Keough, who is the daughter of Lisa Marie Presley and also stars in Amazon Prime miniseries Daisy Jones & The Six, moved to approve the deal on Monday (June 12) at the Los Angeles Superior Court.Her grandmother, Priscilla Presley, is set to receive an undisclosed amount to drop her petition against a 2016 amendment to Lisa Marie’s will, which replaced her as a co-trustee.The future of the estate was thrown into question following Lisa Marie’s sudden death in January. Aged 54, she was the daughter of both Priscilla and Elvis Presley, and passed away after being hospitalised for suffering cardiac arrest.“It is with a heavy heart that I must share the devastating news that my beautiful daughter Lisa Marie has left us,” Priscilla said in a statement at the time, announcing the news.

Riley Keough is officially filing to become the SOLE trustee of her late mother’s estate.

The head of the country’s largest labor union joined striking Writers Guild film and television writers at a rally on Monday outside the New York City offices of streaming giant Amazon and said the writers’ cause has the support of workers from across unionized labor. 

Clayton Davis Senior Awards Editor Variety Awards Circuit section is the home for all awards news and related content throughout the year, featuring the following: the official predictions for the upcoming Oscars, Emmys, Grammys and Tony Awards ceremonies, curated by Variety senior awards editor Clayton Davis. The prediction pages reflect the current standings in the race and do not reflect personal preferences for any individual contender. As other formal (and informal) polls suggest, competitions are fluid and subject to change based on buzz and events.

Daisy Jones and the Six” does the opposite — the women are a unit. “From Disney movies that came out when we were tiny, that’s what we were seeing,” says Riley Keough, who portrays rockstar Daisy Jones in the Amazon Prime Video adaptation of Taylor Jenkins Reid’s book, which flipped that trope on its head. It was that reason why I chose the women of “Daisy Jones and the Six” for our Women of Awards Season issue. Keough, Suki Waterhouse and Camila Morrone aren’t in competition. Even their characters, three independent women fighting for success and love, weren’t in competition — and two were in love with the same man. 

The day that SAG-AFTRA began its talks with Hollywood studios over its own film and TV contract with a strike authorization in hand, picketing Writers Guild members on Wednesday hit up Disney and Warner Bros in Burbank.

Apple may have entered the virtual reality arena earlier today with the unveiling of a new platform and headset, launched with the help of Disney boss Bob Iger, but in the real world it spent the day being targeted by writers.

WGA negotiating committee co-chair Chris Keyser issued a clarion call to members and supporters earlier today.

It was Pride and Drag Queen picket day in Los Angeles, where around 300 people hit up Warner Bros. Discovery to highlight their issues as the strike marches into its second month.

EXCLUSIVE: Liza Koshy (A Family Affair) has closed a deal to star opposite Ariana DeBose, Amanda Seyfried, Megan Stalter and Chloe Fineman in My Ex-Friend’s Wedding, the new comedy from director Kay Cannon (Blockers) that Sony picked up in March, in a competitive situation.

As one of Reality TV’s royal family crossed the line, striking film and television writers joined forces on Wednesday in New York City with another group of culture workers involved in a pay dispute: musicians. 

Sex and the City” universe will be whole again. Variety has learned that Kim Cattrall will reprise her iconic role as Samantha Jones in the Season 2 finale of “And Just Like That,” Max’s revival of HBO’s “Sex and the City.” But she will only appear in one scene. According to sources, Cattrall shot her dialogue on March 22 in New York City, without seeing or speaking with the stars of the series, including Sarah Jessica Parker, or with “And Just Like That” showrunner Michael Patrick King. In the scene, Samantha, who in the show has moved to London, will have a phone conversation with Parker’s Carrie Bradshaw. In the first season of “And Just Like That,” Carrie engaged with an estranged Samantha over text, and in the finale, the two made a plan to see each other in order to reconcile.