Brian Cox Says AI Replacing Actors Is a “Human Rights Issue”

"It's actually an identity theft. And it's very, very prevalent at the moment."

Cox Cage

Although nobody's rushing to replace Brian Cox's gravelly voice or Shakespearean visage anytime soon, the Scottish "Succession" star is still looking out for the little guy in a recent interview where he trashed the use of AI in the TV and film industry.

In a chat with England's Sky News, Cox sounded off on the use of AI in Hollywood as the Screen Actors Guild strike over the issue nears its fourth month.

Though he didn’t specify his exact worries, the British crown-honored thespian suggested that producers may take advantage of fledgling actors in contracts that sign away their rights to their likeness — the exact kind of thing SAG-AFTRA is looking to head off in its protracted disagreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers (AMPTP).

"The younger actors are put in a situation where they're told they have to do this and they don't, but they don't know that at the time," he said.  "It's been pretty horrendous. And then the deal, you know, we give you $50 or £50 to have you in perpetuity well, basically, I'd have told them to fuck off."

Cox said that although his concerns about AI don’t exactly keep him up all night, he still wants the whole debacle "to be sorted."

"I think AI is a human rights issue," the actor said. "It's not just a union issue. It's actually an identity theft. And it's very, very prevalent at the moment."

Hairy Business

This characteristically Coxian interview was not the first time the onetime King Lear has gone off about AI, either. The day SAG first went on strike, Cox told the BBC he was chagrined by AI "putting words in your mouth," which he called, in a charmingly classically-trained mannerism, a "total nonsense."

"It’s pretty hairy," he told the public broadcaster back in July. "So we need to nip it in the bud good and proper."

A few weeks after that interview, Cox spoke at a SAG solidarity rally in London and called on his fellow actors to "put a stop" to the tech.

"There is no line drawn down the middle of the Atlantic Ocean that says that the problem stops there, because it doesn’t," the 77-year-old told the crowd. "This is a shared fight against the misuse of technology and automation by all the unions and the working class."

It’s good to see such a huge and respected star joining his fellow actors across the pond — and in spite of playing mad kings, he’s clearly got clear eyes when it comes to the danger AI poses for everyone in the industry.

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