After the disruption of the 100-day writers strike, Hollywood is growing uneasy because of the actors’ pending contract negotiations.

Every movie about a strike needs a heroine, someone brash enough to stand on top of a table with a megaphone and demand justice.

But some credit for the possible ending of the three-month-old strike by the Writers Guild of America may be going to a different sort of heroine.

New York Times reporter Michael Cieply writes today that Laeta Kalogridis, most recently the executive producer of Bionic Woman, helped bring the warring parties together not with a megaphone but with a phone and with e-mail.

With the writers strike, many TV addicts are left with only reality television to entertain them. To help fill the void, reality show heavy-hitter, American Idol, returns tonight and tomorrow for its seventh season premiere on Fox.

But American Idol may be one reality competition that isn’t actually about winning or losing. Lately, winners have been losing recording contracts and losers are topping charts, winning Grammys and Oscars, and debuting on Broadway.