Insane AI videos of celebs are everywhere —should they embrace them or call their lawyer?
Marilyn Monroe has been re-cast as a TSA agent going through poeple’s bags in one AI video. @MichaelsMonsters /YouTube
Michael Jackson leans over a KFC table and says, “Your chicken’s looking nice, pal,” before snatching the box. Marilyn Monroe is resurrected as a TSA agent rifling through luggage, while the late physicist Stephen Hawking appears as a dirt biker and WWE wrestler.
None of this, of course, reflects reality. These viral clips are the work of powerful new artificial intelligence video tools that can conjure hyper-realistic scenes of anyone — living or dead — doing virtually anything.
The explosion of such videos accelerated after OpenAI released its Sora 2 text-to-video app on October 1, alongside competing software from Midjourney and Google Gemini. Within days, social media was flooded with AI-generated clips of celebrities, political figures, and even private citizens placed in absurd or offensive scenarios.
While the technology has thrilled some for its creative potential, it has alarmed many more for its capacity for abuse.
Celebrities React — From Amusement to Outrage
Billionaire entrepreneur Mark Cuban is among those taking the AI boom in stride. “I saw one video of me hitting a bong and saying, ‘Oh, this is good,’” he told The Post. “I thought it was funny — I just commented, ‘This is funny, but I don’t smoke.’”
Cuban, who has invested in the AI video firm Synthesia, says he prefers to engage with the technology rather than fight it. “It’s like the first inning of the first preseason game,” he said. “If you learn early, you stand the best chance of using it to your advantage.”
His only rule? If someone uses his likeness, they must include a mention of his discount drug company, CostPlusDrugs. “Someone made a video of me snorting sugar. I just deleted it,” he added with a laugh.
Others, however, are not amused.
AI-generated videos featuring the late Robin Williams — including clips depicting him as a Walmart greeter or Mexican wrestler — have sparked outrage from his daughter, Zelda Williams, who pleaded on Instagram: “Please stop sending me AI videos of Dad. If you’ve got any decency, just stop.”
The estate of beloved PBS painter Bob Ross is equally disturbed. “Fans are calling, saying, ‘This is disgraceful. He was such a wonderful man,’” said Joan Kowalski, president of Bob Ross, Inc. “People think he’s in the public domain because he was on public TV, but he’s not.”
Kowalski has been contacting video platforms to demand takedowns of AI-generated clips showing Ross being jailed or painting in his underwear. “Bob was ferocious about how his image was used,” she said. “He wanted people to be happy with him. This would have upset him deeply.”
Hollywood and Big Tech Clash Over Control
The new AI wave has sent shockwaves through Hollywood. Studios including Disney, Universal, and Warner Bros. Discovery have filed a sweeping lawsuit against Midjourney, accusing it of building its image generator on copyrighted material.
The studios allege that Midjourney’s AI was trained on proprietary images of characters such as Superman, Batman, Bugs Bunny, and Daffy Duck, and that even generic prompts like “classic superhero battle” produce recognizable versions of those icons. They’re seeking $150,000 per infringement, potentially amounting to billions.
Midjourney denies wrongdoing, claiming its system was trained on “billions of publicly available images” and that users, not the company, bear responsibility for any misuse. CEO David Holz has compared AI learning to human inspiration: “If people can look at art and make something new from it, AIs should be able to do the same.”
The outcome of that lawsuit could shape the future of artificial intelligence and creative rights for years to come.
A Legal and Ethical Minefield
OpenAI’s rollout of Sora initially required creators to “opt out” if they didn’t want their likeness used. After widespread backlash from artists and attorneys — who pointed out that U.S. copyright law doesn’t work that way — the company reversed course. OpenAI now says it will give “rightsholders more granular control” over how likenesses are generated.
Entertainment manager Aaron Kogan believes the industry must find a balance between innovation and integrity. “AI is going to upend Hollywood,” he said. “But when we reach a new equilibrium, I hope there’s room for both AI-generated content and traditional filmmaking. I just don’t know what that balance looks like yet.”
For now, the world seems split between fascination and fear. On one hand, the technology can create breathtaking visuals from nothing more than a sentence. On the other, it can just as easily desecrate the legacies of cultural icons — or flood the internet with crude “slop.”
As the debate rages on, AI videos continue to multiply across every platform, portraying everyone from Albert Einstein being escorted out of a fast-food restaurant to Elvis Presley mowing a suburban lawn.
Whether these creations represent the future of art or the erosion of human creativity remains an open question — but one thing is certain: the genie isn’t going back in the bottle.
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