One of the eighty kabillion things I find so upsetting about AI “actor” Tilly Norwood is the direction its creator, Eline van der Velden, decided on for Tilly’s look. Eline is a former actor herself (and a woman!) and she still chose male-gaze coded tropes, like young and (more often than not) inappropriately dressed. As a female Pygmalion, Eline could’ve artificially sculpted the next Ida Lupino or Thelma Ritter! Instead she made fembot Tilly. Just sayin’. Anyway, as we discussed (in horror) last week, Eline trotted Tilly out for a slew of “live” TV interviews. Supposably, Tilly is in front of the press to hype its movie Misaligned, another project from Eline’s production company Particle6, though it has no release date yet.
Overall, Tilly’s interviews ranged from not really being able to handle follow up prodding questions from anchors, to sounding slightly more coherent in transcripts edited for clarity. One thing Tilly was brilliant at in its responses was completely undercutting Eline’s argument that AI “actors” aren’t coming for human jobs. Our coverage went up last Thursday, but on Friday, something spectacular happened: Tilly was on Piers Morgan Uncensored, where Scottish actor Tom Conti (he most recently played Einstein in Oppenheimer) was also a guest and grilled Tilly on a few points. I won’t say the AI was fried, but halfway through an answer it glitched and started speaking Cantonese.
During the interview, actor and director Tom Conti, who was also appearing on the segment alongside Morgan, asked Norwood a question about the film.
“The other actors in the film Misaligned, are they real or are they like you? Are they really human beings and you’ve been put into the scenes? Or are they all computer-generated images?” Conti asked Norwood.
“It’s an interesting point, Tom,” Norwood replied. “My film Misaligned is a hybrid production, meaning real directors, writers and editors are still very much involved. It’s not about replacing anyone, but about exploring new ways to tell stories.”
Conti then pressed Norwood for a more precise answer, noting that she did not address his question.
“Ah, right. You’re asking about the other actors in Misaligned,” Norwood said after a pause, adding, “They’re all digital twins, just like me. It’s a hybrid production, which means…”
Norwood then suddenly began speaking Cantonese for approximately the next 15 seconds — to the apparent amusement and confusion of both Conti and Morgan.
“You seem to be speaking Chinese completely randomly for no reason. Why did you do that?” Morgan then asked.
Norwood responded, “Oh, my apologies. It seems I had a little hiccup there. I certainly didn’t mean to start speaking Chinese or impersonate Piers there. Sometimes my wires get a bit crossed.”
“That was a bit of a curveball even for me,” she continued. “It’s usually a pretty smooth ride, but sometimes these things happen.”
Particle 6 did not immediately respond to PEOPLE’s request for comment.
The clip of the exchange was shared on the show’s X account later that day, and it has since been viewed over 12 million times as of Saturday, Sept. 19.
“You seem to be speaking Chinese completely randomly for no reason. Why did you do that?” No joke, but this is probably the best journalistic work Piers Morgan has done in his entire career. And if you think it sounds awkward in the excerpt, please watch the clip! What the article doesn’t capture are the agonizing pauses between one of the humans asking a question and Tilly starting to respond. Conti even starts a question again because there is no indication that Tilly registered anything. At all. (Also, my compliments to Conti for his phrasing, “Are they real or are they like you,” when asking Tilly about the rest of the cast.) And it’s not only that there are pauses, it’s that you can tell the realistic behavior Tilly has been programmed with — nodding in recognition, blinking, smiling — is clearly on a loop. It all reminds me of the New York Times profile from earlier this year, where the writer/interviewer described Tilly kind of deflating as it absorbed a question, then puffing back out when it had come up with an answer.
In conclusion: Tilly Norwood does not pass the Turing Test. And it may also be a Chinese spy. And it has really bad lighting for something entirely digital, right?
I think a big problem Tilly is going to have is the simple fact that she is so unlikeable. She’s bland and lacks an actual personality, and I find it hard to imagine people becoming genuine fans who want to see her in a movie.
Apart from the gooners, of course.
LOL “sometimes these things happen.” 😂
That interview is hilariously bad. The way she bobs slightly while waiting is creepy, too.
More to the point, have we found the perfect job for Piers? He can ask all the hard-hitting questions to the malfunctioning AIs, and no poor humans are forced to deal with him.
Oh, I want more of those interviews 😂 This is perfect to expose that Tilly thing for exactly what or is. It sounds completely robotic, a 6 yo child has more fluid, meaningful interactions with adults. You immediately understand why this thing will never, ever be able to convey anything that remotely looks like a human emotion – so why would you want to see that thing in a movie?
Wow, that was bad. The pauses while it’s processing is … something.