AI version of Val Kilmer cast in new film one year after actor's death

A generative AI recreation of Val Kilmer has been cast as a co-starring role in a new independent film, making it one of the most prominent uses of AI to place a deceased actor in a new screen production. The film's producers say the Kilmer estate has approved the project. Val Kilmer died in April 2025 at the age of 64, following years of health complications related to throat cancer that had significantly affected his voice and on-screen availability in his final years.

This is not the first time AI has been used to recreate a deceased performer's appearance on screen. Peter Cushing was digitally recreated for Rogue One: A Star Wars Story in 2016, a decision that drew significant criticism given that Cushing died in 1994 and could not have consented. James Dean's likeness was licensed by his estate for a Vietnam War drama in 2019, a project that drew objections from the Screen Actors Guild at the time. The Kilmer project is different in scale from the Dean licensing and different in consent circumstances from the Cushing recreation, but it sits in the same contested territory that Hollywood has been arguing about for nearly a decade.

What the Kilmer estate approved and what that means legally

Estate approval is meaningful but not simple. In California, where most Hollywood productions are based, the right of publicity extends 70 years after an individual's death under the Celebrities Rights Act, first passed in 1985 and amended multiple times since. That means the Kilmer estate controls commercial use of his name, voice, signature, and likeness through at least 2095. When the estate approves a project, it is exercising that right, which is a property right rather than a personal one.

What estate approval does not resolve is whether the deceased person would have agreed. Kilmer himself had a documented and nuanced relationship with AI recreation of his likeness. Before his death, he worked with a company called Sonantic to create an AI voice model based on recordings of his speech, which was used in the 2022 film Top Gun: Maverick to allow him to appear with a voice that sounded closer to his pre-illness delivery. He publicly described that collaboration as something he chose and was involved in. The current project has no equivalent on-the-record endorsement from Kilmer himself.

The union and industry response

SAG-AFTRA, which reached a new AI agreement with the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers in late 2023 following the actors' strike, has specific provisions governing digital recreations of deceased performers. The agreement requires that productions using AI to recreate a deceased member's likeness obtain approval from the estate, which this production has, and that the production comply with the union's AI use disclosure requirements. SAG-AFTRA has not publicly commented on this specific project as of the date of the announcement.

Duncan Crabtree-Ireland, SAG-AFTRA's national executive director, stated in a March 2025 interview with The Hollywood Reporter that the union's position is that estate consent is a necessary but not sufficient condition for ethical use of a deceased performer's likeness, and that productions should also demonstrate that the use is consistent with the performer's documented creative preferences during their lifetime. That standard is harder to apply and creates no clear enforcement mechanism, but it reflects where the public and industry debate actually sits.

What the film is and who else is involved

The independent film is described by its producers as a thriller set in the American Southwest, with a script written specifically around the ability to use AI visual and vocal recreation for Kilmer's role. The production is backed by a private equity group and is not affiliated with any major studio. The film's director has not been publicly named at the time of the announcement. A living co-star is attached but has not been announced.

The choice of an independent production rather than a studio project is notable. Major studios have been cautious about posthumous AI casting following the public backlash to the Cushing recreation and the ongoing sensitivity around SAG-AFTRA's AI provisions. An independent production faces fewer union compliance pressures if it is not a SAG-AFTRA signatory, which is a real possibility for a privately financed project at this budget level.

The broader argument this project is entering

The debate about AI casting of deceased actors involves at least three distinct questions that tend to get conflated. The first is legal: does the estate have the right to license the likeness? In California, clearly yes. The second is ethical: is it right to create new performances attributed to someone who cannot review or reject them? That question has no consensus answer and probably cannot have one. The third is artistic: does the AI recreation produce work that is genuinely cinematic, or does it produce something that is technically competent but creatively hollow?

Kilmer's performance in Top Gun: Maverick, where he appeared physically diminished but emotionally present in a scene written around his actual circumstances, was widely considered one of the most affecting moments in that film. It worked because it was real, not because it was reconstructed. Whether a fully AI-generated performance can produce something with equivalent weight is the question this project will either answer or avoid. Principal photography is scheduled to begin in June 2026.