Writers’ Solidarity Re-enforced at Ceremony

The 40th annual Writers Guild Awards--handed out Friday during the 9,000-member guild’s strike against the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers--were anything but a saturnine reflection on quality.

The award selections themselves were feisty in their lack of predictability. John Patrick Shanley (“Moonstruck”) and Steve Martin (“Roxanne”) won the film honors, while third-rated CBS was the big television winner, taking prizes in seven categories.

But the presentation show had all the earmarks of a pep rally, with actors and (at least temporarily) unemployed writers firing off barbs at the producers and their negotiator, J. Nicholas Counter III.

Most of the evening’s references to Counter were bawdy (and unprintable), and any hint of evenhandedness toward the producers was hooted, both in the pre-dinner cocktail hour and during the awards ceremony itself.

Brian Walton, the guild’s executive director, had pointedly told the gathering assembled at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, “This is a night to celebrate writers and writing.” But the gifts of writers (veteran guildsmen Hal Kanter and George Kirgo served as emcees) and the written--a 13-minute montage of words from classic films made into a short by Chuck Workman--seemed placed in the service of stirring up the guild-dominated audience into sentiments of unity and determination.

The complete list of winners:

Film winners:

Original screenwriting: John Patrick Shanley for “Moonstruck.”

Best screenplay based on material from another medium: Steve Martin for “Roxanne.”

Television winners:

Original long form: John Sayles, “Unnatural Causes,” NBC.

Adapted long form: Reginald Rose, “Escape From Sobibor,” CBS.

Anthology episode, single program: Harry Cauley, “There Were Times Dear,” PBS.

Episodic drama (two-way tie): Debra Frank and Carl Sautter, “It’s a Wonderful Job,” episode of “Moonlighting,” ABC; Georgia Jeffries, “Turn, Turn, Turn, Part 1,” episode of “Cagney & Lacey,” CBS.

Episodic comedy (three-way tie): Barry Fanaro and Mort Nathan, “ ‘Twas the Nightmare Before Christmas,” episode of “The Golden Girls,” NBC; Gary David Goldberg and Alan Uger, “A, My Name Is Alex, Part II,” episode of “Family Ties,” NBC; Jay Tarses, “Here’s Why Cosmetics Should Come in Unbreakable Bottles,” episode of “The Days and Nights of Molly Dodd,” NBC.

Variety-music, Award Tribute, Special Event: Bennett Tramer, “Will Rogers: Look Back in Laughter,” HBO Special.

Children’s Script: Joseph Maurer, “An Enemy Among Us,” CBS.

Documentary-current events: Perry Wolff, “The Battle for Afghanistan,” CBS.

Documentary-other than current events: Theodore Thomas, “The Grizzlies,” PBS.

Television spot news: Thomas Phillips, Paul Fisher, Hugh Heckman, Paul Enger, “Reykjavik Summit,” CBS.

Daytime serials: Claire Labine, Eleanor Mancusi, William Burritt, Madeline B. David, Steve Lehrman, David Appell, “Ryan’s Hope,” ABC.

Television graphic art-network: Kelly Lee, Kris Celich, Jay Haiden, Ray Duke, “Shuttle Disaster,” ABC.

Television graphic animation: Frank Sveva, Ned Steinberg, “Special Events,” CBS.

On-air promotion: Larry Scheflin, “WNET-PBS Promo,” WNET, PBS.

Radio winners:

Documentary: Norman Morris, “Under the Big Sky,” CBS.

Spot news: Les Blatt, “Peter Jennings’ Journal,” ABC.