‘TV’s Top 5’: Chris Keyser Explains the New WGA Deal (and Why He’s Done Negotiating)

Welcome to the 232nd episode of TV top 5, The Hollywood Reporters TV podcast.

Every week, hosts Lesley Goudberg (West Coast TV Editor) and Daniel Fienberg (chief TV critic) provides an overview of the latest TV news with context from the business and critical sides, welcomes showrunners, executives and other guests and provides a critical guide to what to watch (or skip, as the case may be) ).

This week we look at the impact of the double strike in Hollywood from a different perspective: that of the Entertainment Community Fund, which is helping workers affected by the work stoppage. This is how this week’s episode goes:

1. THE WRITERS STRIKE IS OVER!

After nearly 150 days, the Writers Guild of America’s strike against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers is officially over, as the guild’s 11,500 members return to work. This segment looks at the main gains (and central losses) of the provisional new three-year Minimum Basic Agreement.

2. WHAT’S NEXT?

Now that the WGA strike has ended, all eyes are on the artists’ union SAG-AFTRA, as the guild is still about 70 days into its work stoppage. The segment also looks at what’s next for the TV industry now that writers’ deals have been restored, which shows will be the first to return to service, and how the broadcast season might be differently impacted.

3. ATTACK ZONE: CHRIS KEYSER INTERVIEW

Keyser, the co-chair of the WGA negotiating committee, joins us for the third time to discuss the writers’ strike. In the interview, Keyser talks about how streaming transparency and residuals will work, why the AMPTP remains strong in keeping actual viewer data under lock and key, and issues that have surfaced since the deal was announced Sunday, including the minimum room size and why the safeguards for mid-level writers and how that will impact lower-level writers. Plus Keyser announces that he will not return to his role as co-chairman of the negcom at the next round of contract talks in 2026.

4. SERIES OVERVIEW: Reservation dogs

Spoiler alert! We’re actually talking about programming again! Rolling stone main TV critic and BFF of the 5 Alan Sepinwall is back at it again, this time for a critical series review segment on the late and great FX comedy Reservation dogs. Where will the final season rank on Alan and Dan’s 2023 top 10 list? You just have to tune in to find out.

5. CRITIC’S CORNER

As usual, we’ll end with Dan’s thoughts on this week’s new and returning series. In this episode he discusses season three of Max Star struck and the Amazon spin-off The boys, generation V.

Hear it all now TV top 5. Make sure you subscribe to the podcast so you never miss an episode. (Reviews welcome!) You can also email us with any topics or Mailbag Questions you’d like to cover in future episodes at TVsTop5@THR.com.