The Directors Guild of America’s president Michael Apted is expected to announce today the date when the talks for early contract will start.

Talks won’t start before January 1, most likely, but Apted and negotiating committee chair Gil Cates will team up for talks with lead staff negotiator and DGA exec director Jay Roth. They’ve received permission from the DGA board to pick a date for the talks with the Alliance of Motion Picture & Television Producers, Hollywood Reporter informs.

The negotiations due to take place between AMPTP-DGA are the consequence of the breakdown on Friday of the talks between the studio group and the Writers Guild of America.

DGA is known for starting new deals six month before the existing contract expires.

The central matter in the DGA’s negotiations will probably be new-media compensation and jurisdiction.

The DGA's negotiating team held meetings for months and Wednesday night was one of those meetings that lead to speculations that guild leaders will contact AMPTP today.

WGA said that they won’t take into account what the DGA will propose and that they will stick to their contract demands.

Some are saying that cracks in the WGA are starting to appear.

A top show runner said Wednesday: "They tried to split the membership from the leadership (and) it worked to a degree. But once you talk to members, or once show runners talk to show runners, it's pretty easy to see it for what it was -- a decent tactic. I don't think the AMPTP had any intention of negotiating in good faith last week. I think they want everyone to sit out over Christmas and make the town think twice about the cost of taking a strike, so that no one else will do it for a good long while."

The AMPTP gave an ultimatum to the WGA saying to drop the demands about reality TV and animation jurisdiction from their negotiations.

Meanwhile the guild continued to picket in Los Angeles, and in New York meetings took place between guild leaders.

One of the rallies on the West Coast took place outside Paramount, where black, Asian and Latino writers and actors where invited by the WGA West’s committee of diversity to join the rally.

Among supporters where Frances Fisher, Katherine Heigl, Kimberly Elise, Orlando Jones, Rex Lee, T.R. Knight, Sara Ramirez, Tracee Ellis Ross and Isaiah Washington, Variety reports.