Playbill: Academy Award-winning actor Robert Downey Jr. is making his long-awaited Broadway debut starring in Lincoln Center Theater’s world premiere of Ayad Akhtar’s McNeal, currently in previews and opening at the Vivian Beaumont Theater September 30. And making its own Broadway debut alongside the film star? A “highly realistic Metahuman Digital Likeness” of Downey himself.
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The idea and use of A.I in art will continue to frighten me at how powerful it is at telling our stories for us. What I find most interesting about this article is that the theatre and film industry went on strike for about 9 plus months just recently protesting the use of A.I and digital copying of artists on screen and stage, and yet here is a production about to open on Broadway doing just that. The concept and idea of having an A.I copy of Robert Downey Jr. on stage is one that is technically challenging and I would love to see it portrayed on stage. But I wonder if the same message of the show would come across just as well as if there was a stand-in look-alike actor for Robert Downey Jr.’s second character. What Akhtar is doing with this play is monumental, but it will be interesting to see if the theatre world either rejects it or accepts it into a new normal for shows in the future.
AI is popular this week! As the third response to AI in a short time period it is interesting to come across an article that balances AI in close favor to actors and writers rather than just a money-making opportunity. It also brings up a great point that is often missing from new technology, particularly in the digital or information “era” that we find ourselves in; permission. Permission is often flagrantly disregarded or forgotten as AI needs vast amounts of “training data” to be able to reproduce its work to an effective quality. Yet this is not particular to AI, companies gather our data that is not intentionally given to corporations like Google or major retailers that is then sold (without permission or payment for the consumer of our data that is being sold). I think the main problem with AI in creative positions like film, art, and entertainment is that the people it is putting out of work if it is successful will lose their livelihoods and no longer be able to viably produce meaningful art in their lives because the opportunity is being stolen by a meaningless, faceless corporation that only wants money and not change in the world. If a fair deal is given to the artists that the AI is stealing from like Downey letting there be an official digital version of himself, I think AI in creative positions is more allowable. This still does not address the opportunity for new artists to enter the scene if all the spots are taken up by a computer…
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