Members of the Writers Guild of America West have voted overwhelmingly to approve Ellen Stutzman’s contract as the union’s executive director, a year after she led the union through a historic strike.
Stutzman’s contract was ratified with 97% of the vote, with 2,279 votes in favor and 72 against.
Stutzman was promoted to executive director last November when the union announced that David Young, its longtime leader, would retire. Young had taken a medical leave of absence earlier that year, leaving Stutzman as lead negotiator during talks with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.
Stutzman was paid $680,000 last fiscal year, about double her salary when she was deputy director.
The union also announced on Tuesday that three new members have been elected to the Board of Directors.
Melinda Hsu, the showrunner of “Nancy Drew,” was the top vote-getter with 1,491 votes. Chris Hazzard and Danny Tolli were also elected as new board members, finishing fifth and seventh. They will join five re-elected incumbents: Raphael Bob-Waksberg, Deric A. Hughes, Justin Halpern, Travis Donnelly and John Rogers.
Hsu hosts a podcast, “Lead With Kindness,” which aims to change the culture of Hollywood to emphasize kindness and inclusivity. She also ran for the board on a platform of kindness.
“The goal of putting kindness into action specifically drove me to run,” she wrote in her candidacy statement. “If elected, I will help launch Guild-led training to create positive long-term change in the writers’ rooms and wherever the Guild can reach.”
Hsu was a writer for “Lost” and currently has an overall deal at ABC Signature.
Hazzard is a feature writer who, during the strike, took part in the “rapid response team,” which organized and stopped on-location shooting in the early morning hours. Tolli was a strike captain and fate coordinator at Netflix.