Ever since Dutch actor Eline Van der Velden revealed the new AI-generated actor Tilly Norwood, Hollywood has been in a frenzy. SAG members and actors have come out in numbers to oppose the usage of artificially created actors for their projects, and the whole industry looks to be panicking. Unveiled as the next Scarlett Johansson, Tilly has been the talk of the town for quite some time, but she really made some news when Velden talked about getting her some acting gigs. She said during a summit at Zurich, "When we first launched Tilly, people were like, 'What's that?' Now we’re going to be announcing which agency is going to be representing her in the next few months." It did not take long for SAG-AFTRA to release a strongly-worded statement against this move. ALSO READ: Only monsters will play god in Guillermo Del Toro’s new movie Frankenstein, watch trailer The statement read, "To be clear, ‘Tilly Norwood’ is not an actor; it’s a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers – without permission or compensation. It has no life experience to draw from, no emotion and, from what we’ve seen, audiences aren’t interested in watching computer-generated content untethered from the human experience. It doesn’t solve any ‘problem’ – it creates the problem of using stolen performances to put actors out of work, jeopardising performer livelihoods and devaluing human artistry." The organisation has always been against the integration of AI into the industry, considering AI was a major point of contention during the 2023 strikes. Actor Emily Blunt also reacted to Tilly Norwood during an interview with Variety, where she said, "No, are you serious? That’s an AI? Good Lord, we’re screwed. That is really, really scary. Come on, agencies, don’t do that. Please stop. Please stop taking away our human connection." She admitted that she was terrified about AI and did not really know how to react to the news. Veteran actor Whoopi Goldberg gave her two cents on the matter during her show The View. She said, "You can always tell them from us. We move differently, our faces move differently, and our bodies move differently." The backlash is now getting even more serious, with Equity (Actors Guild) also joining in and expressing concerns. Their audio and new media organiser, Shannon Sailing, told BBC Radio, "Tilly is not an actress. She is an AI tool. Or 'it' is in the AI tool. That’s not a performer. But what that tool is is made up of performers’ work, and we are concerned about where that work has come from and if that’s been given consent to be used in that way."
