To the Television networks and Streaming services that produce nonfiction television,

We are the showrunners, producers, associate producers, PAs and more who produce your nonfiction programming. We coordinate with talent, we find interviews, we write scripts that we receive no credit for, we work long hours, often into the nights.

In the best of times, we do so usually with no health care or flimsy healthcare that takes months to qualify for, but which disappears immediately upon the end of our projects.

These are not the best of times.

In the weeks since the coronavirus became a nationwide crisis, many of us have experienced the cost of the industry’s paralysis. Even as millions of people are finding comfort watching the work we made, we worry about finding work and paying bills. Our shows have gone dark, our jobs have been furloughed, those of us who were unfortunate enough to be between gigs when this happened now face the prospect of months without work. Our production companies, which have delivered shows year after year on dwindling budgets and brutally thin margins, face permanent closure. For us, this is a question of survival, of paying bills, buying groceries, and keeping homes. As some production companies try to find ways for us to remain at our posts, others have already performed massive layoffs, affecting thousands. Productions that continued were conducted in unsafe and dangerous conditions to meet unrealistic and irresponsible deadlines.

Each one of us is now staring down the possibility of losing tens of thousands of dollars in expected income. In another industry, there would be severance packages, kill fees, hazard pay. We have received nothing. And no plans have been articulated to lead us to expect that payment is going to be offered.

So rather than wait for a package that will not be offered, we demand the networks set aside a fund to support the nonfiction television industry during this crisis. We intend to hold the networks responsible for keeping the production companies solvent and for providing basic economic security to the nonfiction TV workers.

The immediate need in the industry is economic assistance during the crisis. This could be in the form of continued salary for those whose productions were postponed, furlough pay, kill fees offered directly to employees, or a joint fund where producers who are out of work can apply for grants and relief. Anyone of these options would be better than the nothing that is currently on the table.

We recognize that any relief will be complex and imperfect to institute, but complexity and imperfection are not excuses to do nothing. The methods for assistance could easily be worked out with proper oversight and accountability if there is a will to do so. We need information and honest communication from the networks so we can coherently address this crisis. At this point the question to the networks is how do you treat the companies and people who made the money that is now being hoarded.

This letter reflects the wishes of union members and non-union members, and we expect relief to be offered to all, regardless of affiliation. We expect a response to this letter to be filed with the Writers Guild of America, East, which in this moment of crisis has offered their services.

Signed,
The Nonfiction TV workers and the Nonfiction TV production companies