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AI Actress Tilly Norwood Condemned by Sag-Aftra: Tilly 'Is Not an Actor '

https://variety.com/2025/film/news/sag-aftra-tilly-norwood-ai-actress-1236534779/
20•ourmandave•1h ago

Comments

bitwize•1h ago
The plot of S1m0ne (2002) actually happening was not on my 2025 bingo card.
SunlightEdge•1h ago
Just think how many more interesting movies there could be, if the costs to produce them were drastically reduced. There are pros and cons with AI actors
digitalsushi•1h ago
counter point, think of how much more interesting movies would be if there were only like 3 a year and the rest of your time you were waiting for one

i call this model: everything before 1990

i'm not appealing to tradition, i'm just saying what if our focus is the source of enjoyment... what if 1000 things to pick for dinner is exhausting but 1 that you think about all day always ends up good

Cthulhu_•41m ago
To be pedantic, before 1990 there were nearly 5000 movies released: https://www.reddit.com/r/dataisbeautiful/comments/v1fsld/oc_... (based on IMDB's dataset).

For a better comparison, you could look at China which only allows for a few dozen foreign films per year (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Film_censorship_in_China#Quota...); which films depends on whether the publisher thinks it'll be successful there, whether it passes China's censors, and whether China was involved in its production. It's a different audience though, for example the Warcraft film bombed in the west but was hugely popular in China, possibly because of the relative scarcity of western films there?

gruez•39m ago
Can't you still replicate the experience by only watching the top n blockbuster of the year? Spoiler: it'll mostly be mainstream slop.
suriya-ganesh•1h ago
While this looks good on the surface. The stress and justifications a Director/artists makes to create a movie acts as an effective filter for quality work. Only with a lot of effort from a lot of people is that possible.

Without that effort and filters, We're going to have a deluge of poorly inspired, sloppy content.

My brain just switches off if I realize something is AI generated. be it blogs, videos or audio.

LaGrange•1h ago
That’s a silly framing. Without actual human actors? Considerably fewer. Something around zero I’d say.
LunaSea•1h ago
Theres already plenty of good actor making minimum wage serving coffees in LA while waiting for their breakthrough. Somehow, they are not hired, so I doubt that actor wages is the real issue at hand.
FiddlerClamp•1h ago
And who's going to be able to afford to see them, when all the jobs are gone?
laxd•1h ago
I don't need more movies. I want higher quality movies. And I don't think AI will work out any better for movies than it does for youtube documentaries. It's getting tiresome to find anything worth watching among all the slop.
ksherlock•55m ago
Did porn get more interesting when it's just a bloke, his iPhone, and his trollop wife?
JohnFen•53m ago
I have no doubt there would be more movies. But more interesting? I seriously doubt it, outside of a rounding-error percentage.
gdulli•52m ago
Didn't we learn anything with streaming? The costs will stay low until a new tech is fully established and then continuously go up after we're dependent. Just benefitting different parties. And with streaming the main difference between the old and new parties is that the new ones, being primarily tech companies, added surveillance capitalism.
Cthulhu_•47m ago
But more isn't necessarily better; if producing movies costs nothing, then watching it is worth nothing.

I can fire up chatgpt and have it write a thousand stories. Would you read it?

AI is good for generating content, but that doesn't make it valuable content. And we had low value slop before AI, just thinking of e.g. buzzfeed back when.

Anyway, go browse Youtube, plenty of interesting content that doesn't get enough views as it is.

a96•1h ago
Looks like a lot of people in the business and actors in particular seem to be scared.
Spivak•1h ago
The subtext of this article is screaming that, in the view of professional actors, this AI actress is apparently really good. I think it will be interesting to see if Hollywood gets their version of Hatsune Miku. But it's not like Miku eliminated human singers so I'm not sure what makes this so worrying. We've already crossed the rubicon of CGIing just a regular human over another with Star Wars.
pjc50•1h ago
There's an explicit campaign to AI Great Replacement all non-CEO staff.
dfedbeef•54m ago
Finally, the true artists can work unhindered. CEOs can fund and cancel movies for write-off value all without involving humans.
fullshark•43m ago
And why shouldn't they be?
RankingMember•1h ago
I'd prefer they not even legitimize this composite of various actual human actors (unpaid and uncredited) by calling it "Tilly" like it's a real actor.
digitalsushi•1h ago
If we succeed in creating a Tilly that can replace a human actor, then human actors are at risk of becoming obsolete. Any finite resource that we can suitably convert to infinitely digital is in the same position.

When we invented photography, realistic paintings kinda ... well I'm not qualified to talk about art but I feel like realistic paintings were like the last horse trying to merge into the model T traffic jam.

segmondy•1h ago
if? more like when.
dfedbeef•1h ago
Sounds like you're not qualified to talk about acting either.
dfedbeef•13m ago
Sorry I just woke up. This was unfair of me. Maybe I am just burned out with this industry.
Cthulhu_•49m ago
How did that turn out for animated characters? Mickey Mouse didn't make any human actors obsolete as far as I know.
LurkandComment•1h ago
It's animation not acting. You can do cool things and not have this be an "actor".
elicash•52m ago
I think two things are being communicated with "actor"

1. Unlike traditional animation, these AI characters are being "directed" in a sense that's unlike traditional drawing frame by frame.

2. The broader question of relationships that people are forming with AI, whether that's chatbots or AI influencers or the weird hologram Girls In a Jar stuff or whatever else.

That's not to say that actor is the right term. I think some of this is in "is a hot dog a sandwich" territory. But I think that's what people are trying to say with their use of the term.

Cthulhu_•50m ago
And animated characters doing all kinds of acting or modeling jobs isn't exactly new.
0x000xca0xfe•1h ago
We're getting the Blade Runner future without flying cars :(
wmeredith•1h ago
"Is that a real dog?"

"Ask him."

js8•1h ago
Good news though, we will still get Harrison Ford! He will definitely be a replicant.
0x000xca0xfe•57m ago
Still waiting for the Bicentennial Man story to happen with an agentic LLM specialised in judicial tasks. The perfect chance for AI Harrison Ford.
nerdjon•1h ago
As if we did not need to worry enough about AI slop writing being injected into movies, now we get AI slop acting. Guess it was nice having some culture that actually grew for a bit... now we just constantly repeat everything and never deal with problems in any real way.

Seriously though, practically I just don't understand how this would work unless the entire movie was just CGI, AI Generated, whatever to begin with if real actors are supposed to work with a fake thing like this.

elicash•1h ago
> AI slop acting

So if the technical challenges are solved and the AI acting is quite good, that changes your view of it?

> I just don't understand how this would work unless the entire movie was just CGI... if real actors are supposed to work with a fake thing like this.

Actors have worked alongside CGI characters for many decades, I remember watching Who Framed Roger Rabbit in the late 80s.

Applejinx•53m ago
If you postulate 'good', who is in there wearing the AI actor like a mask?

I find it easy to imagine some disabled, or disfigured, otherwise blocked-from-stardom person using tech like this to transform themselves and be able to express their truth without being unfairly judged by the physical form they were born into.

But that's not what we're talking about, is it? Be honest.

If you want to impress me, well, I'm a techie nerd. Make a furry celebrity actress, that's the expression of a person. Like a Hollywood-grade implementation of a VTuber. Let 'em be driven by a person that I can get to know and recognize. In this day and age I'm not wedded to forcing everybody to be trapped in the form they're born in, still less so in art.

But this is NOT what we're talking about. You're going to have an AI by committee, drawn from a pandering mass of popular reactions, producing problems not unlike modern-day movies that try so hard to pander to the audience at any given moment that there's no weight to them and no point to any of it.

Here's hoping we also get the other thing. Sort of 'T-pain autotune turned into a style' but for acting. And again, I'm down with it if it's letting artists execute on realities they are otherwise completely unable to reach. But that's not what we're going to get, is it?

exsomet•34m ago
> I find it easy to imagine some disabled, or disfigured, otherwise blocked-from-stardom person using tech like this to transform themselves and be able to express their truth without being unfairly judged by the physical form they were born into.

Outside of a select number of A-list actors, are there situations where the other 85-90% of actors are able to express their truth today?

One of the common problems with creative industries (and the primary reason I switched away from pursuing game development) was that you're not expressing your truth; you're expressing someone else's truth in exchange for money. And unless you have lots of other intangible and often uncontrollable qualities, and are willing to play politics, you will probably never end up in a position to express your truth (with any degree of notoriety) through your own or other people's work.

I am not disabled or disfigured, and while I'm blocked-from-stardom that's just because I have a fairly uninteresting existence overall that wouldn't warrant it on it's own. So I can only guess at this stuff from an outside perspective, but from where I sit, I don't see AI as a sea-change enabler for the people you're referring to.

nerdjon•45m ago
> So if the technical challenges are solved and the AI acting is quite good, that changes your view of it?

That "if" seems to be the running thing with everything AI right now. "If" we can fix hallucinations. "If" we can make it actually think and reason. "If" we can make a general AI system. And so on.

"IF" we actually hit that point that these systems can create truly creative genuine work instead of being nothing more than predictive engines than maybe we can revisit this conversation. But the fact is we are not there and we are nowhere near there considering we are still just iterating on the fundamental problem of these just being predictive engines.

> Actors have worked alongside CGI characters for many decades, I remember watching Who Framed Roger Rabbit in the late 80s.

Yes you are right, but there is a pretty massive difference between knowing what the fake thing will do that is already scripted, storyboarded, etc (ultimately controlled by a human the entire time) vs an AI thing that will be an unknown.

elicash•35m ago
1. Hallucinations have been reduced. There are, in fact, reasoning models. The "ifs" are not as theoretical as you imply. But the reason I raise the question on what happens if the acting is of high quality is because it's important to be clear on what your objection actually is to the thing.

2. Your issue on the "how do actors work alongside AI characters" is that actors won't be able to do a good job themselves because it's not storyboarded enough for them? That AI characters aren't rigid enough?

dfedbeef•39m ago
Pretty sure that was HGI
Simulacra•1h ago
AI movies, audiobooks, it's coming. Like every other industry that is pushing for AI to reduce cost and eliminate people, this is just another one. I'm convinced a not insignificant number of best selling authors have used AI to write part or entire books. Consider: feed every James Patterson book into it, and say write me a new one. There's a lot to work with.
delichon•1h ago
> audiences aren’t interested in watching computer-generated content untethered from the human experience.

Then what are they worried about? If this is true then it is not a job threat to human actors.

But Pixar proved that it isn't true for their actors made of pixels, so why would it become true when the pixels are arranged with the help of AI?

Cthulhu_•59m ago
That companies send a LOT of money to the "owners" of this animation instead of people linked to their union. Which is valid, but also, it's not a new thing - some years ago there was an AI generated model already that was huge on Instagram, or video game characters (Lightning from FFXIII was a Louis Vuitton model), animated characters (Hatsune Miku is decades old by now), there's thousands if not more influencers/personalities with generated appearances (vtubers), etc.

I don't think it's as big as the media makes it out to be, but there's rumours that people are willing to send money to the company behind the character, if that hasn't happened already, which is of course triggering outrage.

dylan604•52m ago
Just you wait until the unions decide they need more members to collect dues from, and decide it is worth their while to represent AI talent.
nar001•3m ago
How? They're not actual people, companies don't need a union to represent AI characters because AI characters don't need any breaks or good worn conditions, because they're not real
rtkwe•53m ago
Animated movies are still moved and voiced by humans with individual choices. AI models take a lot of that out and smear it down to a lowest common denominator kabuki of whatever 'personality' it's been tweaked/prompted to approximate.
joules77•1h ago
> creativity is, and should remain, human-centered

Gentle reminder human creativity did not produce photosynthesis or crispr or the color blue. Throughout history its a small self praising gatekeeping elite that decides what is labeled creative. Its usually a over-paid nihilistic morally detached leisure class. So good riddance.

add-sub-mul-div•1h ago
Could you dive in to that "over-paid nihilistic morally detached leisure class" and describe it a bit more so I can understand?
mc32•52m ago
What's funny is that they only see the threat to their livelihoods that's where their concern lies.

But... do they protect their human animators from CGI? Or using cheaper foreign filming locations to cut costs?

It's all a continuum but they didn't care about it till it came for them. Nothing else on the continuum mattered... So, yeah, I won t shed a tear for them as they shed no tears for other parts of their production being replaced by different technologies over time.

paxys•43m ago
The only time I hear about this “AI actress” is when people across the industry speak out against it. I’m assuming the negative attention is part of their marketing campaign, and it is working wonderfully. So much so that I actually want to see the end result of casting “her”.

Like everything else in the attention economy if you want it to go away then just stop talking about it.

tao_oat•42m ago
I think this is somewhat overhyped. If you look at the video that actually exists of this character[^1], it's clearly AI slop that falls flat -- honestly kind of embarrasing for the studio to put out. This seems like more of a media stunt than anything.

[^1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sVO_j4czYs

yndoendo•24m ago
I have couple simple things on my bucket list.

1. Never scan a QR code.

2. Never fund AI content.

Human interaction is dying because of AI. It is most predominant in customer service at the moment. All AI customer service disconnects humanity and turns it to an endless voice mail system.

AI content will increase body dysmorphic disorders. As children grow up with AI content, they will see themselves inadequate compared to the the pix-perfect idea of what humans should look like. Yet, humans never looked like that and attempts at plastic surgery will be taken by those who try to look like the AI drawings.

Knowing an actor or actress is a real person makes the more relatable. AI content is a void of that relationship. Adults and children benefiting from knowing some actor or actress or musicians have lived through trauma that hey have or are living through. It helps empower them to keep moving forward versus ending their lives. That human connection is more powerful.

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