Drew Barrymore pauses show production while Bill Maher continues to scab

Actress and talk show host Drew Barrymore announced a reversal in her decision to start filming her show’s next season.

Barrymore initially announced Thursday in a since-deleted Instagram post that her show will start up its fourth season. Its third season ended before the Writers Guild of America strike started on May 2. The actress promised not to discuss or promote “film and television that is struck of any kind” but has since decided to pause production entirely.

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“I have listened to everyone, and I am making the decision to pause the show’s premiere until the strike is over,” Barrymore announced Sunday. “I have no words to express my deepest apologies to anyone I have hurt and, of course, to our incredible team who works on the show and has made it what it is today. We really tried to find our way forward. And I truly hope for a resolution for the entire industry very soon.”

“The reality is that bringing a show back without your writers is an attempt to devalue our labor and devalue the work that we do,” WGA captain Chris Hazzard said at the time Barrymore had announced the show’s return.

Meanwhile, comedian and talk show host Bill Maher has dug in his heels and will continue with his show Real Time without writers. Maher, whose weekly show surrounds news events, admitted he’s provided his staff with “some assistance” but that they still are “struggling mightily.” As a result, the host predicted the show “will not be as good as our normal show” because it won’t have a monologue, desk piece, New Rules, or an editorial segment because they were all written parts of the show, which was interrupted by the strike midseason.

“There is a distinction between Bill Maher and the others because he is a Writers Guild member. The others, I believe, are SAG members, and they may have waivers to do the shows. I’m not sure, but he’s a Writers Guild member, and he’s going back to work. So yes, a lot of people are saying that’s scabbing,” WGA West President Meredith Stiehm explained to Jake Tapper on The Lead shortly after the news broke. “There’s definitely some anger that he’s doing that.”

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WGA writers are made up of some 11,500 members and have been on strike for 138 days on Sunday. The last time the WGA and the Screen Actors Guild, and the American Federation of Television and Radio Artists were both on strike was in 1960, with Ronald Reagan at the helm before he ran for president. SAG-AFTRA has been on strike for 65 days as of Sunday.

Both groups are striking against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers, which has come to a head for WGA members over higher wages. The most recent offer to WGA from the AMPTP came on Aug. 11, and was released unaltered on Aug. 22.