Robin Williams’ Mrs Doubtfire co-star has suggested the late actor’s voice should be revived using AI.
Matthew Lawrence, who played Williams’ young son in the film, has said he’d “love” to see the legendary voice behind Aladdin’s Genie brought back via artifical intelligence.
The star of countless films including Jumanji, Patch Adams and Night at the Museum, Williams died by suicide in 2014, aged just 63, after receiving a Parkinson’s diagnosis.
“I would love — now, obviously, with the respect and with the OK from his family — but I would love to do something really special with his voice,” Lawrence told Deadline during an interview at San Diego Comic-Con, “because I know for a generation, that voice is just so iconic.
“It’s not just the fact that I knew him and worked with him and so it’s in my head — it’s in everybody’s head,” Lawrence continued. “And it would be so cool.”
While a handful of actors have given permission for their voice to be reproduced using AI, the practice remains highly controversial. Protection from the encroaching use of AI was a key trigger for the recent video game voice actor’s strike, and numerous stars have voiced concern over the fact their vocal likenesses have been used without their permission.
Fortnite recently raised eyebrows when it allowed fans to chat away with a digital reproduction of the voice of Darth Vader, as originally provided by late actor James Earl Jones.
Jones had previously agreed for his performance as Darth Vader to live on after his death, and Lucasfilm had itself used AI to create new dialogue for Darth Vader in the Disney+ series Obi-Wan Kenobi. Still, it took mere hours for players to get Fortnite’s Darth Vader saying things he definitely should not have been saying, before developer Epic Games swiftly stepped in with an update.
So, why does Robin Williams’ former co-star think the actor should be reproduced via AI? According to Lawrence, his idea comes from Williams once voicing a “computerized voiceover” in a commercial.
“It’s kinda like this very contemporary, modern, almost sort of foreshadowing of what’s going on commercial that he did, where he did this computerized voiceover,” Lawrence said.
“And it always stuck with me. And then, during his passing, with the AI coming out, I’m like, ‘Man, he’s gotta be the voice of AI. He’s gotta be the voice in something.’ So yeah, I would love to do that.”
Image credit: Peter Kramer/Getty Images
Tom Phillips is IGN’s News Editor. You can reach Tom at [email protected] or find him on Bluesky @tomphillipseg.bsky.social
