Three huge teamster trucks led the march, and behind them gathered members of SAG, United Healthcare Workers, the Musicians Union, Unite HERE, the United Farm Workers, and many others. Sparsely present were members of the "behind the camera" unions, who according to one disgruntled member, cannot technically support the strike due to a clause in their contract.

But by far the biggest turnout aside from WGA members and friends was the purple-clad Service Employees International Union, one of the largest unions in the country. A representative of the LA local addressed the crowd with a firery speech in which he explained that SEIU members had joined the march in full force because the WGA had supported the janitors working at the studios in their struggle to form a union last summer.

"Solidarity works!!" exclaimed an SEIU member when I asked why she came out.

Several members carried signs and wore shirts from the early days of Justice for Janitors Campaign, back when the campaign's color was red.

The mostly-purple people were in the center of the march, and they kept the energy up and even led some of the more lively chants, including my favorite:

"My people!
We tell the Story!
We tell the whole wide world -- this is writers' territory!"

Some of the less exciting chants included "Hey hey, ho ho, who's gonna write your TV show?" At that moment, I empathized with one lonely dissident wearing a shirt that said "Turn Off Your TV!" He stood at the side of the march, shouting what everyone knows and no one can swallow.

I had a similar reaction to one glaring yellow sign that epitomizes the simultaneous clarity and confusion in this struggle: "The Revolution Will Not be Televised... It will be Downloaded!" The central issue in the strike is how much of a cut writers will get from "new media" revenue.

A handful of members of ANSWER LA carried signs that said "Support Striking Workers! Stop Studio Greed!" and handed out flyers for the Hollywood premiere of "The Trial: The Untold Story of the Cuban 5," narrated by Danny Glover. The film opens on Thursday, Dec 6 at Laemmle's Sunset 5.

Strikers say they are prepared to hold out well into 2008. Negotiations between the WGA and the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Pictures are schedule to reconvene next Monday.

Related from the newswire: Nov15: Video from the Sony Pictures picket line | Nov7: Video from the Culver Studios picket line | Nov7: Pix from the Culver Studios picket line

See also: WGA video: Who are they lying to? | Writer's Strike Blogs | WGA-East | WGA-West | Interviews from WSWS.org | Picket Locations in the LA Area

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