Hollywood is in an ongoing battle with AI technology. The controversy surrounding the concept keeps the bad outweighing the good as people are continuously concerned about it replacing people’s jobs or being used to infringe on copyrights or even moral standards. While there are people like the creators of AI actress, Tilly Norwood, who defend the use of the technology, saying it’s a useful tool, with this tool at the fingertips of the whole world with varying sensibilities, it will inevitably be used for more than that.
The Sora program from ChatGPT has seen a spike in videos that have people resurrecting long-passed celebrities, like this video showcasing Tupac Shakur and Notorious B.I.G. settling their beef on WWE. According to Deadline, Zelda Williams, the daughter of the late great Robin Williams, sent a message out demanding fans stop sending her AI videos of her father. She posted on her Instagram Stories,
Please, just stop sending me AI videos of Dad. Stop believing I wanna see it or that I’ll understand, I don’t and I won’t. If you’re just trying to troll me, I’ve seen way worse, I’ll restrict and move on. But please, if you’ve got any decency, just stop doing this to him and to me, to everyone even, full stop. It’s dumb, it’s a waste of time and energy, and believe me, it’s NOT what he’d want.”sponsored content
She continues to say, “To watch the legacies of real people be condensed down to ‘this vaguely looks and sounds like them so that’s enough,’ just so other people can churn out horrible TikTok slop puppeteering them is maddening. You’re not making art, you’re making disgusting, over-processed hotdogs out of the lives of human beings, out of history of art and music, and then shoving them down someone else’s throat hoping they’ll give you a little thumbs up and like it. Gross.”
Williams would conclude her thoughts with a second Instagram Stories posting that said, “And for the love of EVERYTHING, stop calling it ‘the future.’ AI is just badly recycling and regurgitating the past to be reconsumed. You are taking in the Human Centipede of content, and from the very very end of the line, all while the folks at the front laugh and laugh, consume and consume.”
You may also remember a viral video years ago that had actor Jamie Costa doing a spot-on impression of Robin Williams in a seemingly short pitch for a biopic. While many applauded Costa’s impressive performance, Zelda Williams would still point out how surreal the whole experience was to witness the work without her blessing (while still being very complimentary to Costa).
Interestingly, just months ago, Matthew Lawrence, who co-starred with Robin Williams in the favorite Mrs. Doubtfire, stated that he would love for Williams’ voice to be recreated with AI for a project, but with the family’s blessing. He said, “I would love — now, obviously, with the respect and with the okay from his family — but I would love to do something really special with his voice because I know for a generation, that voice is just so iconic…It’s not just the fact that I knew him and worked with him and so it’s in my head — it’s in everybody’s head. And it would be so cool.”
