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Actor and philanthropist Idris Elba is “an optimist” about AI in entertainment, he said in an interview recorded for Semafor’s Next 3 Billion summit.
Elba told Semafor Media Editor Max Tani that he’s enthusiastic about “the opportunities for underdeveloped communities to catch up with the rest of the world because AI can help them do that. That’s exciting to me. That’s progress.”
There is a contentious debate about AI in Hollywood. The issue was central to actors’ and writers’ strikes in 2023, and mirrors the broader discourse around the AI boom: While some are worried about the technology’s impact on jobs and creativity at large, others see it as a useful tool to unlock new possibilities in movies and TV shows.
“When the synthesizer was created and it had drum kits on it, it didn’t stop drummers becoming drummers. It’s just a different tool set,” said Elba, who is also a DJ on the side. “We went from pin cameras to digital cameras — hasn’t changed photography in any way. A picture is a picture.”
Still, he said, “AI isn’t going to come up with solutions that human beings can’t think of,” but it can be useful in “helping people help each other better.”
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Elba also said AI can be useful in conceptualizing and building brick-and-mortar infrastructure in underdeveloped communities. His charity, the Elba Hope Foundation, is working to build projects like renewable energy grids in Sierra Leone, Ghana, the UK, and US.
That has implications for the entertainment economy, too: Elba hopes to build more studios in Africa to bolster film and TV production there, but acknowledged that it was a “slow process.” “When you say you’re building studios, people want to see shiny buildings very quickly. But for me, there’s a lot of foundational work” that needs to happen first.
Addressing the impact of US funding cuts to philanthropic groups, Elba said such cuts were “inevitable” but that it has “forced leadership to… figure out how to self-generate.”
He said there were opportunities for communities to build systems that are not dependent on aid: “I think that there are many opportunities for developing countries that are used to the aid model to think about this differently.”