Top Agencies and Producers Want Rules Forcing Studios to Devote Half Their Budgets to Television and Independent Films

The Entertainment Alliance of America is implementing rules that help return ownership of series and films to their creators.

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Courier TV is dead. We've been beyond that era for a while now, with the number of shows produced annually post-Covid and post-strikes dropping significantly. As a result, we had the biggest takeover in media history in our industry by merging Paramount with Warner Bros. Discovery and bringing two major streaming services under one roof.

Something needs to change to get more shows and movies on air and better empower the creators. So some of Hollywood's top agencies—a rare coalition that includes CAA, UTA, and WME—as well as top producers like Ron Howard, Brian Grazer, Jason Blum, Mark Burnett, Peter Chernin, and more are teaming up with an idea to bring back the pre-TV era. RELATED STORIES How 'The Diplomat' Shocked Season 4 Debut: 'How Calm We Are [SPOILER]' 'The Diplomat' Review: Season 4 Can't Let Go of One Bad Decision After Another

Those top agencies and producers have formed the American Entertainment Alliance, and according to an announcement in the New York Times, they're pushing for federal legislation that would require major studios — including Netflix, Disney, Amazon, and Skydance — to spend half of their annual content budgets on independent productions in the United States. Instead of the largely consolidated studios producing the majority of their content in-house to air on their broadcast networks, cable channels or streaming services, they would like to see at least half of that content come from production companies outside their walls.

If that were to happen, it would allow the creators of the shows to own what they make. And AEA believes it will create a shake-up in the market, which in turn will create more jobs and more opportunities.

"There are fewer people deciding what gets made and what we all see, what the consumer sees," CAA chief executive Brian Lord told The New York Times. "This change that we're making creates an environment where more things can be funded and so there will be more storytellers, more jobs will be created. Distribution is not the future. It's who is funding the content."

For those old enough to remember, this is a throwback to the days of "Fin Sin" or the Syndicate and Financial Interest Acts of the 1970's. It was a regulation that prevented the three major broadcasters, CBS, NBC, and ABC, from owning the programs they aired or controlling their own syndication. They knew their shows could be broadcast, and they could own the rights to it and decide where it was broadcast in the future. As the Times noted, it led to independent, creative and talent giants like Castle Rock, Mary Tyler Moore's MTM Enterprises, "Dallas" producer Lorimar and many others.

But these rules were lifted in the 1990s after the rise of cable, with the belief that there was now more than enough competition to make it a problem. The AEA says that's when media consolidation kicked in, leading to 41 percent fewer script submissions than independent producers and thousands of job losses.

In addition to funding, AEA also requires production companies to be able to have their own shows and have licensing rights. So, in theory, a popular show gives Apple another shot at reselling the show to another broadcaster in later years, or perhaps a canceled show can be more easily sold by another broadcaster and saved.

To try to advance this, AEA stakeholders are meeting with people who helped draft a recently introduced bill to create a federal tax credit for films produced in the United States. We've already talked about how shaky this legislation ended up being, and it remains to be seen if it will be passed permanently after the midterms. While Fin-Syn rules were previously set by the FCC, the FCC has little oversight of streaming, so the AEA is looking to introduce rules instead.

Despite the heavy hitting, it all comes with big challenges and caveats. Not only is something of this nature a struggle to get past this polarization of Congress, but the studios themselves are fighting it, saying they should be able to have their own content, and buying a bunch of programming from outside sources anyway. There are countless shows and movies from the likes of Imagine, Blumhouse, MRC, and others that make up AEA that have thrived in the current ecosystem.

But a diversity of voices and more power for creators is a good thing in our book, and it's refreshing to have such big names coming together to fight for the little guys.