Robert Downey Jr. has never been the one to shy away from speaking his mind, and he has done it again as he has drawn a clear line in the Hollywood sand about his digital look. While AI is becoming a matter of increasing concern in Hollywood among other creative industries, actors are worried about their looks, voice, and even mannerisms getting replicated and misused.
While there already have been multiple cases of deepfakes and using actors’ voices without their permission, Downey Jr. has made it amply clear that he has legalities in place if any such thing is to happen to him. Here’s what he said.
Robert Downey Has Safeguarded His Tony Stark Identity Well In Advance
Talking to Kara Swisher on ‘On With Kara Swisher’, Robert Downey Jr. warned Hollywood AI buffs that he intends to make people pay if at all they misuse his identity. “I am suing all of the executives, going forward,” he clarified, who signed off on the creation of a Downey digital replica, especially under Marvel with relevance to his popular role as Iron Man.
Downey made it clear that he doesn’t want his face popping up due to AI trickery. The topic arose in considering Downey’s days with Marvel, and how that may take the rights and freedom to use AI in reworking his famous character, Tony Stark. “I am not worried about them hijacking my character’s soul,” he said during an interview.
“How do I feel about everything that’s going on? I feel about it minimally because I have an actual emotional life that’s occurring that doesn’t have a lot of room for that,” he said. Adding that he is confident that he wouldn’t get replicated without his consent, stating, “There are like three or four guys and gals who make all the decisions there anyway, and they wouldn’t do that to me with or without me,” he said.
However, the show’s host Swisher schooled Downey on the realities of the situation, highlighting that future executives may not be as courteous. Downey retorted, “I would like to here state that I intend to sue all future executives just on spec.” When Swisher quipped that he’d be long gone by then, he had a sly retort, “But my law firm will still be very active.”
Robert Downey Jr. Is More Than Ready For His Next Adventures
Robert Downey Jr. is battling AI on the airwaves, but he’s also battling the issue in the theatre. He is taking on Silicon Valley heavyweights, such as OpenAI’s Sam Altman, to task in his new Broadway play ‘McNeal’, which takes aim at corporate overreach in the age of AI.
When asked about it, Downey stated, “The problem is when these people think they are the custodians of managing this. That is a massive mistake. It turns me off.”
In case you missed it: Tom Holland Reveals Robert Downey Jr. Saved His First Spider-Man Scene From Getting Cut, Asked “Where Did All Of The Kid’s Lines Go?”
Meanwhile, in a Marvel twist, Downey is gearing up for his MCU comeback — not as Tony Stark, but as the infamous Doctor Doom. He is expected to make a debut appearance as a villain in ‘Avengers: Doomsday’ set for release in 2026. Rest assured, Downey is still in the game, being himself and not an AI doppelgänger.
