Directors of Wilt Chamberlain documentary 'Goliath' defend use of AI in recreating legend's voice

As actors and writers strike in the entertainment industry in a fight they claim is for their job security and fair wages, there are still films making their anticipated releases. "Goliath" is one of them, and it premiered at the Uninterrupted Film Festival in Hollywood last week, and since then it has been on the hot seat for the use of artificial intelligence.

"Goliath" is a three-part documentary examining the historic life, career and impact of basketball legend Wilt Chamberlain. Controversy has surrounded the documentary due to the use of an AI-created voice of Chamberlain. That has raised questions regarding the ethical integrity of “recreating” the voice of someone who is deceased.

Directors Christopher Dillon and Rob Ford, and the film’s production team, went through a tedious process to ensure that they captured Chamberlain authentically. That included getting approval for the use of AI for Chamberlain’s voice from his family.

“The idea [for the film] came from our desire to give Wilt what he wanted in his lifetime, " Dillon said, describing the motivations for the film. “But he didn't get it, which is the opportunity to try to correct what he thought were the misconceptions about him.”

The directors said the relationship between the family and the film came via Hall of Famer Kevin Garnett, who facilitated the relationship between the Chamberlain family and the filmmakers. Garnett is also a producer of “Goliath.”

“When we first presented the idea to them, they were excited and thought it was super cool,” Ford said. “From a technological standpoint, and just wow, that sounds interesting. I'm not sure they fully comprehended it, probably neither did we and what that actually meant, until you get into hearing it.

“And then on the back end once it was done, and we shared it with them, they loved it. They were very emotionally touched to feel like they were able to reconnect with their 'Uncle Dip,' which is what they called him, or their 'Brother Dip.' And truthfully they had a hard time distinguishing the AI voice from his real voice when they were watching the movie, straight through whether it's archive or it's AI, which for us, that's like a great testament to how well done it is if the actual family can't separate because they know him and his voice.”

The production team partnered with a Ukrainian company, Respeecher, to produce the AI voice for Chamberlain. The voice heard in the film started with a voice actor, who was recorded reading excerpts from Chamberlain’s journals. With the actor’s voice along with archival audio footage of Chamberlain and quotes from his journals, Respeecher recreated the voice.

Dillon and Ford emphasized that the actor's voice is essential as he is the one who produces the emotion, cadence and tone of the voice heard in the film. That was important considering Chamberlain had a speech impediment.

“We wanted Wilt to be present," Dillon said. “And surprisingly for someone as famous as he is, because of when he lived, there just isn't a ton of footage of him talking about these things. And there were no audiobooks or anything like that. So we selected quotes that he wrote or that he was quoted as saying in periodicals or newspapers that we felt were the appropriate commentary on the story that we were telling. And we casted a voice actor to read them.”

Respeecher has also partnered with Disney to produce AI-generated voices for some of the Star Wars spinoff series, most notably recreating the iconic voice of James Earl Jones as Darth Vader.

Due to the current labor strike in the entertainment industry, AI has been a hot topic, notably as a threat to take away jobs from people. Ford said that has contributed to the pushback they have received in regard to the AI prominence in “Goliath.”

“Like anything in life, you know, technology continues to advance and create new opportunities to do funny, unique, cool, interesting things,” Ford said. “I think it's just about how you do it and making sure, case by case, that people are compensated if that is a scenario that's relative to that situation, or are credited appropriately, or asked for approval and support, if someone's voice is going to be used.

“For us, it's very different because writers are striking in the sense of these are people who are alive, who have celebrity and name and voice recognition who don't want their stuff to be appropriated, whereas Wilt is deceased. We didn't even have an option from inception to interview him, which would have been our first option, if we could have interviewed him, and this would not be an issue.”

Dillon has reservations about the future of AI, but feels differently in the way it was used in the film.

“In retrospect, I wish that we had leaned into our disclaimer, just making it very clear that there's an actor involved here because I think people are in some of the reviews projecting onto it. That it was all generated by a computer and therefore, it sounds robotic to them, but it's like, actually, no, that's a human being saying those words. And that is, in a way, someone's, like, sort of cognitive bias coming in, in part because they don’t know how we did it.”

Though the film has faced criticism, Ford and Dillon are confident that they handled the use of AI the right way, and once the labor strife is resolved, the project will be appreciated.

“I think folks will embrace it. Five, 10 years from now we look back, it'll probably just feel commonplace and normal, in the space of these types of projects, in my opinion.”