What You Need To Know About The AMPTP (And Other Headlines)

The dual strikes in Hollywood have become flashpoints of what's being called the "hot labor summer," where workers across the country are battling for everything from better working conditions to fair wages.

Meet the AMPTP

If you've been following the Hollywood strikes, you've undoubtedly gotten spoonfuls of alphabet soup when the discussion turns to the main characters: The writers in the form of the WGA (Writers Guild of America), the actors in SAG-AFTRA (Screen Actors Guild—American Federation of Television and Radio Artists) — and the mighty AMPTP.

SAG-AFTRA and WGA seem simple enough to figure out. But ... what exactly is the AMPTP?

The Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers has been around for nearly a century. Lawyers and executives from some of the top studios and streamers — such as Netflix, Paramount and Universal — make up its ranks. And, as my colleague Caitlin Hernández explains, its main focus during labor negotiations is to keep the interests of the executives aligned to drive for the best possible deal. It's one of the few things that unites what would normally be a field of rivals. Its influence and power also stretch into areas beyond entertainment. Check out the rest of Caitlin's piece as they take a deeper dive.

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Wait... one more thing

Trace the origins of West Coast hip-hop

One of the walls at the home studio of Alonzo "Lonzo" Williams, the godfather of West Coast Hip-Hop.

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Samanta Helou Hernandez

/

LAist

)

There isn’t a universally set point in time for when the seeds of hip-hop started flourishing on the West Coast, but that signature West Coast sound — you know it when you hear it — does have a “godfather”: Meet Alonzo Williams, who has put in more than 40 years of work in the music industry.

In his hallowed Gardena studio, Williams crafted the first record for the World Class Wreckin’ Cru, one of the most historically impactful groups in music history — one that is generally credited with pioneering West Coast hip-hop.

This month, How To LA has been exploring the genre’s origin story, and there are few people better to go to than Williams. We’ll let him tell it.