News
Entertainment & Sports
Feb. 27, 2002
Television Writers' Age-Bias Case Moves to State Court
LOS ANGELES - Moving their fight against alleged age discrimination in the entertainment industry to a new venue, 150 television writers have filed 23 class actions in Los Angeles Superior Court against networks, studios and talent agencies, according to their attorney.
The suits, against the likes of FOX, Disney, and William Morris, originally were filed as a single complaint in federal court in 2000. However, in January, Judge Stephen V. Wilson ruled that the entities had to be sued separately and that talent agencies couldn't be sued for age discrimination under federal law, according to the lead plaintiffs' counsel, Paul C. Sprenger. Wynn v. National Broadcasting Co. Inc., 00-11248 (C.D. Cal 2002).
As a result of Wilson's ruling and with the hope of expediting a trial, Sprenger of the Washington, D.C., firm of Sprenger & Lang said he decided to file the suits in state court.
"We wanted to get to trial, and we think we can do that in state court," Sprenger said Tuesday. "We have some different claims under state law, and rather than arguing about the size of the table in federal court, we're going to state court and hope to be in trial a year from now."
While the plaintiffs now are suing under the state Unruh Civil Rights Act, the allegations in the Superior Court suits are essentially the same as those in the federal suit. The plaintiffs, all of whom are older than 40, contend that studios, networks and talent agencies have a practice of refusing to hire or represent writers of their age. The entertainment companies stereotype writers, the plaintiffs say, as not having the energy for the job and not being able to write for the younger demographic they want to attract.
"In the pool of writers in the world that write for TV, about two-thirds of them are over 40. The fact is that something less than one-third of the employed writers are over 40," Sprenger said. "That means they are getting hired into the writing staff at about one-half the rate that younger writers are."
Neither Patricia Glaser of Christensen, Miller, Fink, Jacobs, Glaser, Weil & Shapiro, who represented the talent agencies in the federal suit, nor Jane Howard-Martin of Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, who represented the employer defendants in the federal suit, could be reached for comment.
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Erin Carroll
Daily Journal Staff Writer
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