- A main tension in the ongoing Hollywood strike has been the potential of using AI to replace actors.
- Strikers say that studios proposed paying a day's rate in exchange for actors' digital likenesses.
One of the biggest worries among striking Hollywood actors has been the possibility of studios using AI to replace them. The related issue of body scans, which can be used to generate digital recreations of someone, is top of mind for some background actors, according to a new report from NPR.
Alexandria Rubalcaba, a background actor who worked on Marvel's "WandaVision" series on Disney+, told NPR that she and dozens of other extras were directed by production crew to a tractor trailer where they each had their faces and bodies scanned for about 15 minutes.
Rubalcaba told NPR that she was never told how the digital replica of her that was created that day might be used. Nor was she told that she would ever receive payment from it, she said in the interview.
Disney did not immediately return Insider's request for comment. Insider reached out to a profile matching Rubalcaba's name and image on Facebook, but did not receive an answer ahead of publication.
Big names in the industry might have more power to prevent their digital likenesses from being used — Samuel L. Jackson, for example, once said in an interview that he always reads over his contracts and removes clauses that allow studios to use his image "in perpetuity." Less successful actors, however, might not feel like they have that same agency. NPR interviewed 5 extras in total who also said that they underwent body scans by studios and feared retaliation if they pushed back or refused. Most were required to sign non-disclosure agreements, they told the publication.
Insider previously reported that studios the SAG-AFTRA union have been negotiating with have proposed paying background actors a day's rate in exchange for companies taking scans that could be used to create their digital likenesses in perpetuity.
The union's national executive director and chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland said at a press conference that the proposal in question stated that these companies "should be able to use it for the rest of eternity in any project they want with no consent and no compensation," though the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP) disputed this.
"Actors now face an existential threat to their livelihoods with the rise of generative AI technology," Crabtree-Ireland said.
A representative from the AMPTP disagreed with this characterization, previously telling Insider in a statement that their proposal to use the digital replicas of background actors includes seeking permission from actors and bargaining for the use in a single project.
You can read the other background actors' stories over on NPR.