Post-socialist Writers´ Rooms
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| Year of publication | 2014 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description | This paper will discuss adaptation of the American-style writers' room concept in Czech television and consequences it has had for creative workers, mainly writers and directors, and the resulting television content. A local version of this collaborative model has largely replaced single-author writing on long-running TV series, both in private and public TV. This transition took place within the past 6 years, and it is far from over, still being perceived by the members of the professional community as a fundamental and sometimes painful change of their working lives. On one hand, writers feel their work is being stabilized, professionalized, better paid, and brought in line with international standards, on the other hand, they experience increasing routinization, interchangeability, anonymity, and disempowerment. Preliminary evidence shows that this process is paralleled in other post-socialist countries of the East-Central Europe. The change from individual to collaborative writing will be illustrated by a case study of a new series commissioned by the "Czech Television", the national public broadcaster. This historical family saga was designed as quality program with high production values and elaborate narrative structure, in contrast with more commercially oriented shows where the writers' room model was originally implemented. Its writing process differed from the typical Czech long-running series, bearing striking resemblances to the older single-author model and securing more important role for the director vis-a-vis the writers. The field notes will be supplemented by close reading of different screenplay materials and by semi-structured interviews with key television writers and producers, to propose balanced ethnographic account of the writing process and its effects on the resulting text. |
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