Ike Barinholtz is on a roll and I am so here for it! He played like a champion and won Celebrity Jeopardy in 2023, doing well enough to return for the Tournament of Champions. And clearly he was busy filming in 2024, because this year saw the release of two hit shows he’s a part of: Running Point, which he co-created with Mindy Kaling, and The Studio, Seth Rogen’s inside Hollywood satire that just landed Ike his first Emmy nomination, for best supporting actor in a comedy series. It’s a treat to see someone who’s been steadily working for nearly 30 years having a moment in the spotlight. And more good things are coming! The current buzz is that Ike is in talks to play Elon Musk in a new AI-themed movie, AND it’s being directed by Luca Guadagnino. Mr. Barinholtz, you have arrived!
Hot off his acclaimed turn in Apple’s The Studio, which earned him his first Emmy nomination, Ike Barinholtz has entered talks to play Elon Musk in Luca Guadagnino’s new AI-themed feature Artificial for Amazon MGM Studios, Deadline has learned.
Barinholtz joins an ensemble that also includes Anora breakout Yura Borisov, Andrew Garfield, and Cooper Koch.
Official plot details for the film are being kept under wraps, although it’s described as a comedic drama set in the world of artificial intelligence. While unconfirmed, sources say the film revolves around the period at the artificial intelligence company OpenAI in 2023 that saw CEO Sam Altman fired and rehired in a matter of days.
Musk is, of course, the world’s wealthiest man — the billionaire entrepreneur behind companies like Tesla, SpaceX, Neuralink, and X (formerly Twitter), who cofounded OpenAI alongside Altman and others in 2015. Musk left the company in 2018, reportedly due to disagreements about the direction OpenAI was going in, among other factors. He’s been vocal about his issues with OpenAI’s shift toward a for-profit structure and its relationship with Microsoft, and warned repeatedly about the potential dangers AI poses to mankind. Nonetheless, he’s pursued his own AI ventures through Tesla, Neuralink, and xAI, a lab he launched two years ago. His AI chatbot Grok was integrated into X in 2023.
Simon Rich wrote the script for Artificial and will produce alongside Heyday Films’ David Heyman and Jeffrey Clifford, as well as Jennifer Fox. The project was first announced in early June.
One of today’s rising comedic multi-hyphenates, Barinholtz plays Sal Saperstein, VP Production at the fictional Continental Studios, in Apple’s hit show biz comedy The Studio co-created by Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg, among others, which recently landed the most Emmy nominations of any freshman comedy in history with 23. Recently, he also co-created Netflix’s hit sports comedy Running Point, starring Kate Hudson, which has been renewed for a second season. He is repped by UTA, Artists First, and Yorn, Levine, Barnes.
Monica Barbaro remains in talks for a role in Artificial.
Tell me again, what’s the title of this movie? Did you say Artificial? Cause I seem to remember a certain effortlessly witty blogger opining a couple months ago that given AI’s stumbling, error-filled and theft-ridden track record, we should drop the “intelligence” and simply call the technology “artificial.” But unlike the original content AI absorbs without consent or compensation, that blogger didn’t copyright her brilliant renaming suggestion, sigh. Potential title-stealing aside, this movie sounds great! I don’t know how Guadagnino turns out thought-provoking films as rapidly as he does — Challengers and Queer both came out last year, and he has After The Hunt premiering this fall. The cast is stacked, and I buy Ike as Elon. Sure, the makeup department may have to douse him in baby powder to get that shockingly-white hue of Musk’s husk, but Ike has the experience, not to mention the MADtv chops to nail the rest. Congrats to Ike on all his ongoing good fortune, and what foresight he had to start the hair loss injections when he did so his mane would be primed for this moment!
Photos credit: Jeffrey Mayer/Avalon, Justin Ng/Avalon and Getty Images for Netflix via Netflix press
I think Elon is gross, but I could TOTALLY buy Ike playing him. He’s so funny and has some similarities in his features. The plot sounds so convoluted though!