Jon Stewart Says Streamers Like Apple and Amazon Are Turning Writers’ Rooms Into ‘Ruthlessly Efficient Content Factories’: ‘I Can’t Function Like That’

Jon Stewart went on Conan O’Brien’s podcast and talked about how tech-giant streamers like Apple TV+ and Amazon Prime Video are changing Hollywood.

“There was this legacy business, and you’re seeing it change now as Silicon Valley comes in,” Stewart said. “The ethos of legacy entertainment is: we’ve created this incredibly eccentric business, where you need an agent and a manager and a lawyer, and they’re going to take about 60% of what you make, but without them there’s nothing you can do! And you join the studio, and the studio will give you a deal, and you’ll sit in your room. It’s the most inefficient way. Silicon Valley walked in like in the way Elon Musk walked into Twitter and went, ‘How many people work here? 10,000? Make it two.'”

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Stewart said that companies like Apple and Amazon have disrupted the legacy system by entering writers’ rooms and cleaning house. Stewart imitated a Silicon Valley streamer coming into a writers’ room of 14 and cutting it down to four — “and it’s got to be on Zoom,” he quipped.

“They’re changing the ethos into this… they’re changing us from an analog business to a digital business,” Stewart added. “And I think that’s the schism, the earthquake that’s been going through [Hollywood]. I can’t function like that.”

O’Brien remarked on the fact that many writers in Hollywood — both veterans and newcomers — are having trouble finding work.

Stewart concurred: “These companies don’t believe in institutional knowledge that allows people to grow and get better and create more. What they believe now is the auteur system, which has always existed within film and TV, and then this idea of ruthlessly efficient content factories, where what matters is the real estate and not the individual creative.”

Added O’Brien, “I think the problem, if I had to guess, would be that you can’t explain what happens in a writers’ room to anybody who hasn’t been in one.”

One of the victories for writers as a result of the 148-day WGA strike in 2023 is minimum staffing requirements designed to curb the rise of “mini-rooms.” Staffing for writers’ rooms is now determined by the length of a show’s season (with exceptions for series like “The White Lotus,” for which a single person writes every episode). By securing these requirements, the writers aim to preserve the pipeline for junior staffers to gain experience on shows and rise through the ranks to eventually become showrunners.

Stewart, who is currently back on Comedy Central as one of the hosts of “The Daily Show,” has experience with streamers like Apple TV+, which aired his last series, “The Problem With Jon Stewart.” Apple canceled the show after two seasons as Stewart detailed disagreements between himself and the streamer. Stewart said Apple didn’t want him talking about the perils of AI on the show, and did not want him to interview the chair of the Federal Trade Commission, Lina Khan, whom Stewart later had as a guest on “The Daily Show.”

Watch the full clip from “Conan O’Brien Needs a Friend” below.