(Photo: Patrick McMullan)

The bad part about actually living up to the WGA’s strike protocol: When the walkout is over, there’s way too much work to do. “We really obeyed the rules, in that we didn’t write anything during the strike,” said Guild good girl Tina Fey at a party on February 12, the night before Writers Guild members returned to work. “So now we’re like, ‘Holy moly, we have to write five episodes starting tomorrow.’” As the strike seemed to be winding down, Fey said, the writers had some phone conversations, and they realized even some already-completed work would have to be redone. “Before the strike, we had some episodes in outline form,” she said, “but we’re adjusting them because instead of being in the middle of the season, it’ll be more of a mini–season premiere. The last episode we had on the air was in January.” In Fey’s twelve weeks off work, she said, she ate a lot of grilled cheese and hung out a lot with her daughter, Alice. “It was the maternity leave I never had,” Fey said. “It was the blessing inside of the stink bomb.”

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