Morgan Freeman has made it clear he’s not comfortable with artificial intelligence using his voice.
The 88-year-old actor, whose distinctive voice has narrated countless projects, told The Guardian he hasn’t authorized AI to replicate his vocal signature. The technology has sparked ongoing debate in Hollywood, with concerns about replacing actors and questions surrounding consent and ownership rights.
Some performers have welcomed the technology, including the late James Earl Jones, who approved Ukrainian firm Respeecher to recreate his iconic Darth Vader voice following his retirement from the role. Morgan, however, takes a different stance on having his voice duplicated by AI.
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“I’m a little PO’d, you know. I’m like any other actor: don’t mimic me with falseness. I don’t appreciate it and I get paid for doing stuff like that, so if you’re gonna do it without me, you’re robbing me,” The Shawshank Redemption star told the publication, in an interview that was published on Monday, November 10.
When asked whether his voice has been utilized without authorization, Morgan responded, “Well, I tell you, my lawyers have been very, very busy.”, reports The Mirror US.
He revealed they’ve discovered “many” instances and are currently pursuing “quite a few” cases.
Beyond voicing his frustration with unauthorized AI voice replication, he also shared his tepid reaction to Tilly Norwood, described as an “AI actor.
“Nobody likes her because she’s not real and that takes the part of a real person, so it’s not going to work out very well in the movies or in television … The union’s job is to keep actors acting, so there’s going to be that conflict,” Morgan said.
Dutch actor and comedian Eline Van der Velde created Tilly through her AI company Particle6. The company marketed her as the world’s first “AI actor” when they officially unveiled her in September.
The announcement sparked immediate criticism from prominent actors—including Emily Blunt, Melissa Barrera and Simu Liu— alongside condemnation from the American actors’ union.
The Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) issued a statement in response to Tilly, asserting that creativity “should remain human-centered” and expressing opposition to replacing human performers with “synthetics.”
The union clarified that Tilly isn’t an actor but rather a “character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers – without permission or compensation.”
They emphasized that Tilly lacks life experiences or emotions to draw upon, arguing that audiences have no interest 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, jeopardizing performer livelihoods and devaluing human artistry,” their statement continued. The statement concluded by reminding signatory producers that they can’t use “synthetic performers without complying with our contractual obligations, which require notice and bargaining whenever a synthetic performer is going to be used.”
This reference pertained to Eline’s comments during a panel at the Zurich Summit in late September, where she revealed that she was in talks with multiple talent agencies interested in representing the AI creation.
Following the 2023 actors’ strike, the SAG-AFTRA contract approved in December of that year included safeguards for actors’ names, voices, likenesses, and performances against AI.
In response to the backlash, Eline published a lengthy statement on Instagram on September 28. She argued, in part, that she viewed Tilly not as “a replacement for a human being, but a creative work – a piece of art” and that she considered AI as “a new tool,” drawing comparisons to “animation, puppetry or CGI.”
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‘ Some details of this article were extracted from the following source www.the-express.com ’
