Robin Williams’ daughter Zelda speaks out against ‘disturbing’ AI recreations of late actor amid WGA deal
Robin Williams’ daughter has spoken out against recreations of actors using artificial intelligence.
Zelda Williams took to Instagram stories to condemn the recreations of actors’ likenesses and voices without their consent.
The 34-year-old’s comments come as the Screen Actors Guild is set to resume negotiations with studio heads.
The Noobz actress said she was not “an impartial voice” in the SAG’s fight against the use of AI.
“I’ve witnessed for years how many people want to train these models to create/recreate actors who cannot consent, like Dad”.
The actress added that her feelings on the use of AI aren’t just due to personal circumstances.
“I’ve already heard AI used to get his ‘voice’ to say whatever people want and while I find it personally disturbing, the ramifications go far beyond my own feelings.
“Living actors deserve a chance to create characters with their choices, to voice cartoons, to their human effort and time into the pursuit of performance.
“These recreations are, at their very best, a poor facsimile of greater people, but at their worst, a horrendous Frankensteinian monster, cobbled together from the worst bits of everything this industry is, instead of what it should stand for,” she wrote.
Robin Williams was protective of his likeness being used.
Williams famously feuded with Disney after they used the Genie from Aladdin to sell merchandise.
The SAG negotiations come as the Writers Guild of America ended their strike after brokering a new deal that included protections against AI and SAG will be hoping for the same.
Under the contract, raw, AI-generated storylines will not be regarded as “literary material” which means they will not be competing with computers for screen credits. Nor will AI-generated stories be considered “source” material.
Writers also have the right under the deal to use AI in their process if the company they are working for agrees and other conditions are met. However, companies cannot require a writer to use AI.
