Brad Pitt has said artificial intelligence could help more mid-budget films get made if it is used as a creative tool, particularly for producing visual effects that would otherwise be prohibitively expensive. Speaking in a new Esquire cover story, the actor argued that AI could ease financial pressure on films budgeted between $40 million and $90 million, a range that has become increasingly difficult to fund in Hollywood, though he expressed more caution about AI being used to replicate actors' performances.

Pitt said the outcome would depend on who was directing the AI's use and shaping the emotional choices behind a performance, adding that any AI-generated version of his acting "might not be my choices and what I found and discovered in the thing." He also discussed the practice of body scanning actors, revealing he has had contract clauses requiring his own scans to be destroyed for the past 20 years, and noted he had recently heard an AI-generated song he thought was "pretty damn good" but ultimately repetitive compared with a real human voice.