Fans Slam ‘Hollywood Elite’ Reese Witherspoon For Her Take On AI: ‘Smells Like a Power Grab’ – Globe Magazine

Reese Witherspoon has embraced Artificial Intelligence — and the humans on X are coming after her for it.

“I’m always looking forward to how media is evolving and how I can help be part of bringing women along in those emerging industries,” the Morning Show actress told Glamour while promoting the new season of her AppleTV+ hit.

“And now we’re doing it with AI. It’s so, so important that women are involved in AI… because it will be the future of filmmaking. And you can be sad and lament it all you want, but the change is here,” Witherspoon, 49, continued, adding that she uses the technology every day.

“It will never be a lack of creativity and ingenuity and actual physical manual building of things. It might diminish, but it’s always going to be the highest importance in art and in expression of self.”

Some fans agreed with the Hello Sunshine producer’s comments, noting that AI is here to stay. “She’s spot on,” wrote one X user. “If women aren’t in the room shaping that future, the art we get will be missing half the story.”

But many more were outraged. This “smells like a power grab by Hollywood elites, sidelining regular creatives while she pushes for women to dominate a tech boys’ club,” wrote on X user, while another noted that “it’s easy to say this when you own a production company and see your job vanish while your creative colleagues are thrown out on their asses for an algorithm recycling the last century of cinema.”

Others reminded the Legally Blonde actress that AI usage was one of the reasons actors went on strike in 2023. “When they make an AI film with her face and it’s a scene that she wouldn’t do if she was dead or alive it’s gonna be a whole different story,” wrote one commenter, adding that AI is “literally going to steal jobs from real life actors and actresses.”

Witherspoon’s comments were similar to those made by Ben Affleck at CNBC’s Delivering Alpha 2024 investor summit.

“What AI is going to do is going to disintermediate the more laborious, less creative and more costly aspects of filmmaking that will allow costs to be brought down, that will lower the barrier for entry, that will allow more voices to be heard,” the Accountant star, 53, told the crowd. “It’s not going to replace human beings.”

Unlike his fellow Oscar winner, the actor and director was praised for his “articulate” and “grounded” understanding of the technology.

After reading Witherspoon’s comments, another X user said, “I want to see one of these ‘A-listers’ tapdance when asked point-blank about how this crap simultaneously steals from artists and hastens environmental collapse.”