Hollywood's SAG Awards announces it will change its name The Screen Actors Guild Awards, the marquee awards ceremony honouring actors, is getting a new name. Known colloquially as the SAG Awards, the awards show will now be dubbed the Actor Awards presented by Sag-Aftra, the labour union representing US film, television and radio actors. Since the beginning, our statue has been called'The Actor' and we're a show that's entirely about actors, so this new name is a perfect next step in the show's evolution, the show's executive producer said on Friday. The rebrand comes ahead of the 32nd edition of the star-studded ceremony, which is set for 1 March 2026. The award show's executive producer Jon Brockett told the BBC that the name change - which was announced at a board meeting on Friday - gives viewers in more than 190 countries an immediate understanding of who we are and what we're about - a show about actors honouring actors.

Amazon's Used Over 350 AI Shots in Season 2. Its Creator Isn't Sorry The show, which follows David's ascent to King of Israel, used four times as much AI this season, including for many of its battle scenes. A dusty visual overlay partially obscures crowds of men in the desert, sword-fighting in armor and on horseback. With some wardrobe tweaks, this scene could look like something out of or . But showrunner Jon Erwin says he didn't have the budget to bring these scenes to life. Instead, he used AI .

'A character generated by a computer program' 'AI actor' Tilly Norwood in AI Commissioner. 'A character generated by a computer program' 'AI actor' Tilly Norwood in AI Commissioner. Emily Blunt and Sag-Aftra join film industry condemnation of'AI actor' Tilly Norwood US actors' union joins stars in opposition to Norwood, which it says was created'using stolen performances' The controversy around the "AI actor" Tilly Norwood continues to grow, after the actors' union Sag-Aftra condemned the development and said Norwood's creators were "using stolen performances". Sag-Aftra released a statement after the AI "talent studio" Xicoia unveiled its creation at the Zurich film festival, prompting an immediate backlash from actors including Melissa Barrera, Mara Wilson and Ralph Ineson. Sag-Aftra said it believed creativity was, "and should remain, human-centred. The union is opposed to the replacement of human performers by synthetics."

On Wednesday, members of the Screen Actors Guild–American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, or SAG-AFTRA, voted to ratify a new contract for video game performers, officially bringing an end to a nearly yearlong strike. A majority, 95 percent of members, voted in favor of the contract, which guarantees annual raises for three years, increased compensation, and guardrails designed to prevent game companies from giving their work to AI. Actors in the video game industry had been on strike for 11 months as part of a fight to secure protections against AI, a sticking point that held up negotiations for most of that time. Every other issue in the contract, including compensation and working conditions, was already resolved months ago, says SAG-AFTRA's national executive director and chief negotiator Duncan Crabtree-Ireland. The strike was temporarily suspended in June, pending contract ratification. According to Sarah Elmaleh, a voice actor who also serves as a SAG-AFTRA committee chair, actors in the games industry have been wearily eyeing AI for years--even before tools like ChatGPT exploded in use.

Gov. Gavin Newsom on Tuesday signed into law two bills that will give actors more protections over their digital likenesses, addressing concerns brought up during last year's Hollywood strike led by performers guild SAG-AFTRA. One of the bills, AB1836, prohibits and penalizes the making and distribution of a deceased person's digital replica without permission from their estate. The other legislation, AB2602, makes a contract entered after Jan. 1, 2025, unenforceable if a digital replica of an actor was used when the individual could have performed the work in person, if the contract did not include a reasonably specific description of how the digital replica would be used and if the actor was not represented by their lawyer or labor union when the deal was signed. "No one should live in fear of becoming someone else's unpaid digital puppet," said Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, SAG-AFTRA's national executive director and chief negotiator in a statement. Newsom has led the way in protecting people -- and families -- from A.I. replication without real consent."

According to Bloomberg and The New York Times, Meta is in talks with the likes of Keegan-Michael Key, Awkwafina and Dame Judi Dench, among others, for its AI projects. The company apparently intends to incorporate their voices into a conversational generative AI-slash-digital assistant called MetaAI, which is rumored to be like Siri and Google Assistant, which could live within Facebook, Meta hardware, and all the other parts of the multimillion-dollar social network company. The actors' representatives are still negotiating for stricter limits, though SAG-AFTRA has reportedly agreed on terms with Meta. SAG-AFTRA, if you recall, fought for provisions to protect actors from the threat of job loss due to AI. Didn't Meta already do something like this? Yes. During its Connect event last year, the company also introduced a chatbot platform with 28 "characters" voiced by celebrities, including Snoop Dogg, Paris Hilton, Dwyane Wade and Kendall Jenner.

A future artificial intelligence product by Meta could have you chatting with celebrities. According to Bloomberg and The New York Times, the company is in talks with Awkwafina, Judi Dench and Keegan-Michael Key, among other celebrities from various Hollywood agencies for its AI projects. The company apparently intends to incorporate their voices into a conversational generative AI-slash-digital assistant called MetaAI, which is similar to Siri and Google Assistant. Meta plans to record their voices and to secure the right to use them for as many situations as possible across Facebook, Messenger, Instagram, WhatsApp and even the Ray-Ban Meta glasses. Bloomberg says negotiations have started and stopped many times, because both sides can't seem to agree with the terms for use.

More than 300 video game performers and Hollywood actors picketed in front of the Warner Bros Studios building on Thursday to protest against what they call an unwillingness from top gaming companies to protect union voice actors and motion capture workers equally against the unregulated use of artificial intelligence. Standing before the crowd, Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, national executive director of the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists (Sag-Aftra), said that AI has become the most challenging issue in many of the union's negotiations. "We've made deals with the studios and streamers. We've made deals without a strike with the major record labels and with countless other employers, which provide for informed consent and fair compensation for our members," he told the Associated Press. "And yet, for some reason, the video game companies refuse to do that and that's what's going to be their undoing."

Video game workers--whatever their job, employer, or status--have clearly had enough. This month alone, the labor movement has made some of its biggest advancements ever in organizing the techies, artists, and creatives who keep the largest, most culturally significant sector of the global entertainment industry running and thriving. First, on July 19, came "wall-to-wall" union approval at Fallout-maker Bethesda Game Studios, which meant that everyone from engineers to artists could establish a comprehensive unit with the Communications Workers of America. They quickly earned recognition from parent company Microsoft, marking the first wall-to-wall effort to succeed at any of the Big Tech firm's gaming studios. On July 24, even more company workers got into the game.

Video game performers with SAG-AFTRA will strike beginning Friday as AI "loopholes" have caused concerns. Beginning at 12:01 Friday morning, video game voice actors and motion capture performers under the Screen Actors Guild-American Federation of Television and Radio Artists will strike over artificial intelligence protections. This is the second strike for SAG-AFTRA performers in video games. While the union has conceded that wages and job safety have made gains in video game contracts, AI in interactive media continues to be a source of insecurity. TENS OF THOUSANDS OF GAMERS DESCEND ON LAS VEGAS FOR THE EVO TOURNAMENT SAG-AFTRA Chief Contracts Officer Ray Rodriguez shared at the presser on Thursday that some performers' work may be treated as "data" under current AI guidance.