Ladies and gentlemen, start your improvising. 

The Writers Guild of America announced Monday that it has denied the Hollywood Foreign Press Association's waiver request to allow striking union scribes to prepare material for next month's 65th Annual Golden Globe Awards. 

Meaning, the banter at the ceremony, which will air live Jan. 13 on NBC, is going to be either nonexistent or, depending on who shows up, somewhere between banal and unusually vitriolic. 

"The Golden Globe Awards, which has a long and friendly relationship with the Writers Guild of America, is obviously disappointed that the WGA denied its request for a waiver," read a statement released by the HFPA.

"However, we are encouraged by the fact that the WGA has announced that it plans to negotiate agreements with independent production companies. Therefore, we will attempt to reach some type of agreement with them on behalf of the 65th Annual Golden Globe Awards, which will recognize and honor outstanding achievements in both movies and television programming made before the strike." 

The guild's negotiating committee informed WGA members last week that it is going to approach studios on an individual basis, a move meant to exploit the cracks that are surely forming between companies that have less to worry about it the strike continues and those that are having a tougher time than some.

And in crushing the HFPA and Dick Clark Productions' hopes for a routine telecast, the WGA may have also shaved an hour off of next year's Oscars: The WGA West's Board of Directors has denied the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences' routine request for permission to use clips from films and past Academy Awards shows during the 2008 ceremony. 

The ceremony is still scheduled to be hosted by guild member Jon Stewart, who, if the strike continues, would theoretically be prohibited from penning his own material beforehand. ABC has the rights to that possibly lackluster broadcast.

"Writers are engaged in a crucial struggle to achieve a collective bargaining agreement that will protect their compensation and intellectual property rights now and in the future," WGA West president Patric Verrone wrote in a letter to the Hollywood Foreign Press and Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which chooses the Oscar field.  

"We must do everything we can to bring our negotiations to a swift and fair conclusion for the benefit of the writers and all those who are being harmed by the companies' failure to engage in serious negotiations. 

"The WGAW's [board] concluded, reluctantly, that granting exceptions for the Golden Globes or the Academy Awards would not advance that goal," Verrone said.  

The celebratory mood that usually accompanies the announcement of the year's Golden Globe nominees was tempered last week by the possibility of a WGA picket line that could keep some of Hollywood's biggest stars away from the event. 

While Tom Hanks, Julia Roberts, Denzel Washington, Johnny Depp, America Ferrera, Jaime Pressly, Katherine Heigl and scores of other A-listers were spilling their thrill, the WGA was also busy filing charges against the Alliance of Motion Picture and TV Producers with the National Labor Relations Board, accusing the studio reps of negotiating in bad faith and prematurely leaving the table. 

A move that the alliance cast as a "desperate complaint" that proves the union's negotiating strategy "has achieved nothing for working writers." 

Monday marked the beginning of week seven of the writers' walkout, which has affected production on numerous films and shut down about 60 scripted TV series. Close to 10,000 people are out of work, and the stoppage could wind up costing Los Angeles County $1 billion if it continues into next year—which, unless Santa's packing contracts, is almost a certainty.

The writers' previous deal with the studios expired Oct. 31, and the strike began Nov. 5 after the two sides failed to reach a new arrangement that took into account the scribes' demand for higher residuals from content distributed online and through other digital channels. 

Talks resumed the week after Thanksgiving but shut down again Dec. 7 after the alliance reportedly got fed up with the WGA's unwillingness to take less pressing items off the table, such as their request to unionize all writers who work on reality TV and animated programs and films.

Earlier Monday, NBC announced that Jay Leno and Conan O'Brien, whose late-night shows have been in repeats since the strike began, will be back on the air Jan. 2, albeit without any writers.

The WGA has denied that the imminent return of fresh late-night fare—David Letterman's Worldwide Pants is expected to announce a similar arrangement soon, although the CBS host is looking to make a deal that would allow his writing team to return with him—represents a breakdown in the union's solidarity or is evidence of dissension within the ranks.

Word around town is that dozens of top writer-producers, frustrated with the short shrift they've been getting from the conglomerate-owned networks and studios, are, if not ready to jump ship altogether, seriously considering what online production has to offer.

"The companies are pushing us into the embrace of people that are going to cut them out of the loop," a series show runner who isn't participating but is observing the trend told the Los Angeles Times.

"We are one Connecticut hedge-fund checkbook, one Silicon Valley server farm and two creators away from having channels on YouTube, where the studios don't own anything."