By RAY KELLY
Artificial intelligence might one day be used to reconstruct The Magnificent Ambersons, but for now it will crassly approximate Orson Welles’ voice for an AI-powered travel app.
“Orson Welles Can Now Be Your AI-Generated Tour Guide,” trumpeted a business story published today by Variety.
Much kinder than the sad truth: They are sifting through Orson Welles’ ashes looking for a dime.
Make no mistake, this is a cash grab. It does nothing to further Welles’ artistic legacy. It serves only to make him a commercial pitchman to a new generation.
The Storyrabbit app (a partnership of Treefort Media and Beatrice Welles’ Orson Welles LLC) uses a point of interest to generate an audio story that lasts up to 90 seconds, delivered by “AI Orson” or a host of your choice. In the sample released by Storyrabbit, the AI voice claims: “This is the voice of Orson Welles, curious as ever, and I’m ready to reveal what has been hidden for too long. With Storyrabbit, I now walk beside you.”
Except, Orson is not walking beside you. He’s been dead for 40 years.
Storyrabbit’s faux Orson, like “Digital Marilyn,” is the latest example of the commercial exploitation of dead celebrities without their prior consent.
Orson Welles was no vestal virgin when it came to commercial work, but it was his choice – not his heirs – to hawk Findus frozen peas, Nashua photocopiers or Paul Masson wines – and he did so chiefly to finance his motion pictures.
Welles was first and foremost an artist, something he made clear in a BBC interview three years before his death.
“I’ve spent too much energy on things that have nothing to do with a movie,” Welles said. “It’s about 2% movie making and 98% hustling. It’s no way to spend a life.”
Orson is now condemned to shill in the afterlife.
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