Empire Magazine: The AI actor giving Hollywood the jitters

For the December issue of Empire Magazine, I spoke with Beth Webb about Tilly Norwood and the true threat of AI to the acting industry. “The AI actor giving Hollywood the jitters” responds to the headlines surrounding Tilly – a fully AI-generated actor with over 65k followers on Instagram, a new short film and, reportedly, a schedule of meetings with real agents to discuss representation. Watching Tilly’s latest film — which is really more of a commercial featuring AI characters delivering lines directly to camera — I wasn’t entirely sure what all the fuss was about. However, the potential for commercials to replace actors with AI does feel like a real and present threat. Why pay £10,000 to an actor for restricted usage when an AI generator offers unlimited creative possibilities for $14.50 a month?

Tilly isn’t the only AI personality to hit the headlines. Channel 4’s Dispatches became the first British television programme to use an AI presenter in their documentary, ‘Will AI Take My Job? DISPATCHES’ — a stunt which only revealed that the presenter was entirely AI-generated in the last few seconds.

For actors, I believe AI poses a legitimate concern. But please don’t despair just yet. As I discuss in the article for Empire Magazine, AI actors (so far) can mainly be found acting alone, working in isolation. There’s no second actor in the equation. What makes a brilliant actor is the accuracy of their listening, their availability to be affected by the other person, the ability to recognise human behaviour and respond with specificity. It’s not about how I say the line, it’s about how I navigate what I’m receiving. So from what I’ve seen, whilst this technology is astounding, it hasn’t even begun to tackle the challenge of acting with a scene partner.

If you’d like to read the full article you can find it in the December issue of Empire Magazine.