Shawn Levy says AI will become an ‘essential tool’ for filmmaking
Director Shawn Levy has finished post-production on ‘Star Wars: Starfighter’.
The highly anticipated film, starring Ryan Gosling, Amy Adams, Matt Smith, Mia Goth and Aaron Pierre, won’t hit theaters until May 28, 2027.
“I am in the beautiful sanctity of the editing room,” Levy told me at the Breakthrough Prize Ceremony on Saturday. “We’re not coming out until next year, so it’s a rare film where I don’t have a release date. So I’m sitting in the dark silence of the editing room trying to find the best possible shape for the film.”
It sounds like AI won’t be an important tool in finding that shape. “To date, I have not integrated AI in any meaningful way at any stage of my storytelling process, but I have no doubt that we will see its integration over the course of my career,” said Levy.
A prolific director and producer, Levy’s credits include “Stranger Things,” “Deadpool & Wolverine,” “All the Light We Cannot See” and “The Adam Project.”
“To the point that much smarter people than me have made it, it’s about integrating these technologies responsibly and still with the primacy of the creative voice and not about a potential replacement for that voice, because I think what you get from the creative voice and vision is unique and irreplaceable. But if we can use these emerging AI capabilities to support storytelling in still a kind of creative and human-first workflow, then I think it’s something to embrace, not fear.”
Regulation is key, Levy said. “I spend part of the day improving my knowledge of the regulatory options surrounding it [AI]“I think it will be essential, but I think we have to bury our heads in the sand and pretend that it will not just be an emerging phenomenon, but an essential part of our lives, and not just of filmmaking. [but] lives, I think that would be naive and foolish.”
In a separate interview during the Breakthrough Prize Ceremony, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said he believes AI will benefit Hollywood more than it will hurt it The industry is concerned as critics of AI worry that the technology will lead to job losses, illegal use of IP and more.
“I think people really care about the people behind the stories, the art and the creative work that matters so much, so my instinct is that it will go the other way and in the future people will care more about people and more about human creators, not less,” he said.
