TORONTO – The U.S. television writers strike which is set to begin at 12:01 am Monday morning shouldn’t impact this season’s ongoing television schedule, said CanWest Global’s television president Kathy Dore – as long as it’s a short strike.
“Generally, there’s a sense that the stockpile of current programming is enough to take most networks and most programs up through the end of the calendar year,” said Dore during CanWest’s conference call with financial analysts this afternoon on the release of the company’s year-end numbers.
“Obviously, the U.S. networks are all looking at contingency plans and beginning to produce more reality programming,” she added. “If the strike isn’t settled relatively quickly, that will pick up.
“We don’t foresee huge implications- assuming that the strike doesn’t go past December,” added Dore.
“And we do have a benefit from the standpoint that our program supply agreement with E! which provides us with a great volume of programming that is not impacted by the writers strike.”
