Is Tom Hanks Doomed To Be Digitally Resurrected By AI?

Actor Tom Hanks believes he will be starring in new film roles long after his death, as he speculated on the possibility that his likeness could be captured by AI.

Appearing on Saturday’s episode of The Adam Buxton Podcast, Hanks said:

“What is a bona fide possibility right now, if I wanted to, I could get together and pitch a series of seven movies that would star me in them, in which I would be 32 years old from now until kingdom come.”

Hanks went on to speculate that an AI doppelgänger would, one day, be almost indistinguishable from his real self.

“Anybody can now recreate themselves at any age they are, by way of AI or deep fake technology.” Hanks said. “I could be hit by a bus tomorrow and that’s it, but my performances can go on and on and on … Outside of the understanding that it’s been done by AI or deep fake, there’ll be nothing to tell you that it’s not me.”

For those who admire Hanks’ memorable, iconic performances, such as Forrest Gump, The Green Mile and Toy Story, the podcast interview was a depressing glimpse of the future of Hollywood.

Is Tom Hanks right about AI?

Hanks is correct about the likelihood of the digital clones of actors, dead and living, littering the entertainment landscape in the near future; in fact, it’s already happening. A “digital twin” of Bruce Willis famously appeared in a commercial for mobile phone carrier MegaFon that aired in Russia.

James Dean, who died in 1955, was set to be digitally resurrected for the war film Finding Jack, which was reportedly canceled, but not before sparking uproar from movie-lovers and actors. Chris Evans (Captain America) and Elijah Wood, (The Lord of the Rings) both tweeted their distaste for the proposed project.

Under Disney, Star Wars has been something of a testing ground for ghoulish experiments in digital necromancy and de-aging; Rogue One saw a surprise cameo from Peter Cushing, who died in 1994, and was digitally resurrected as Grand Moff Tarkin.

Young Princess Leia also made a brief appearance, minus Carrie Fisher, her digital doppelgänger created through a blend of stand-in, motion capture and archive material. Young Luke Skywalker’s appearance in The Mandalorian was achieved using similar methods, with the character voiced by an AI, trained on the words of Mark Hamill.

The resulting “performance” was just as dull and listless as one would expect.

Can an AI actor really deliver a performance?

The digital clones that audiences have been subjected to so far haven’t exactly been captivating; it’s hard to imagine a dead-eyed, AI-generated replica of Tom Hanks delivering a performance half as compelling as, say, Cast Away.

In his podcast interview, Hanks went on to acknowledge that a hypothetical AI Hanks would not be able to imitate a real performance. But he did wonder if the audience would notice.

“Without a doubt people will be able to tell, but the question is, will they care?” Hanks said. “There are some people that won’t care, that won’t make that delineation.”

Sadly, Hanks might be right about that. Much of the Star Wars fanbase reacted with nostalgic delight to CGI Luke Skywalker, although many found it to be deeply cynical. Notably, the backlash to Mark Hamill’s role in The Last Jedi was far more negative than the reaction to his digital clone.

However, Star Wars is a franchise with a particularly nostalgic fanbase, and CGI Luke only appeared for a few minutes. Surely, even the most enthusiastic fan would find it difficult to sit through the digital creation’s monotonous delivery and eerie smile for much longer.

Legal ramifications

Hanks went on to describe how actors are taking steps to protect their likeness, stating: “I can tell you that there [are] discussions going on in all of the guilds, all of the agencies, and all of the legal firms in order to come up with the legal ramifications of my face and my voice and everybody else’s being our intellectual property.”

Reportedly, a recent Netflix contract sought to grant the streaming giant free use of a simulation of an actor’s voice. One memorable sentence from the contract resembled the dystopian tone of a Black Mirror script, reading, “by all technologies and processes now known or hereafter developed, throughout the universe and in perpetuity.”

Notably, one of the major points of contention between the WGA (Writer’s Guild of America) and the film studios involved the regulation of generative AI, with the WGA seeking to prevent the technology being trained on writer’s work, or being used to write and edit scripts.

The studios completely rejected the proposal, and instead, offered an “annual meeting to discuss advances in technology.”

What do other celebrities think?

The late Robin Williams seemed to foresee the looming threat of AI, and took legal steps to rigorously protect his image from being digitally inserted into media after his death.

Keanu Reeves recently described the rise of deepfakes and AI as “scary.”

“What’s frustrating about that is you lose your agency,” Reeves said. “When you give a performance in a film, you know you’re going to be edited, but you’re participating in that. If you go into deepfake land, it has none of your points of view.”

Reeves noted that the technology had a “corporatocracy behind it that’s looking to control those things,” and described AI as a threat to human labor.

“The people who are paying you for your art would rather not pay you,” he said. “They’re actively seeking a way around you, because artists are tricky. Humans are messy.”