Discuss Back to the Future Part II
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Who else didn't realize that George McFly was replaced?
posted by rooprectSTAFFMOD on October 18, 2024 at 9:24 AM
I just found out today that it wasn't Crispin Glover playing George McFly in BttF II. It was another actor who was wearing a prosthetic mask made from Crispin Glover's face without Crispin Glover's permission. Yeah forget cgi & AI, this was the original Hollywood identity theft.
This is old news, but it was recently stirred up by BttF producer Bob Gale in some recent interviews where he's trying to smooth over the controversy (unsuccessfully it would seem). Summary: Crispin Glover was offered the role but they couldn't agree on salary (Bob Gale claims Glover demanded $2M while Glover says they only offered $125k). So the studio hired a scab actor and made a prosthetic Crispin mask from a mold they'd kept from the 1st movie. Crispin Glover sued, claiming that audiences thought it was him (true in my case), and that the use of his face mask was an illegal use of his likeness. It was settled out of court, reportedly for around $700k paid to Glover.
Here's the full scoop https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yI2RzTTTZc
I'm glad Glover "won" but I wish it had gone to court so it would've set a legal precedent. Hollywood is currently scrambling to figure out what's fair use of an actor's likeness with cgi and now AI making it easy to steal anyone's face. I don't think this is the last we're going to hear about this sort of controversy š
Reply by Midi-chlorian_Count
on October 18, 2024 at 4:13 PM
I really have a bugbear with the term "AI" being used in this buzzword way nowadays to describe programming (!) but yeah, it certainly isn't we'll here of this sort of thing. I think Disney are being sued right now by a friend of Peter Cushing for the unauthorized use of his likeness in Rogue One.
The technology involved may have changed but much the same thing, if a little creepier as you can now seemingly bring the dead "back to life" without their permission to do a turn...
Reply by rooprect
on October 18, 2024 at 5:41 PM
Yeah āAIā is becoming too general, but in this case Iāve seen specific youtube tutorials on how to generate fake AI trailers by telling it something like āMarilyn Monroe in Star Warsā and voila. Itās just a curiosity at this point, but Iām sure itās just a matter of time before Hollywood starts playing with it.
It gets really convoluted if weāre talking about people who are dead like you mentioned Peter Cushing. I hadnāt heard about that, but I imagine itās kinda like Crispinās case where the contract allowed the studio to make someone look similarā¦ but an actual face cast crossed the line. And certainly a cgi Cushing mask would cross the line.