Scarlett Johansson Says OpenAI's New Voice Sounds Like Her — After She Turned Down Their Request to Use It

The actress, who voiced the AI in the film 'Her,' said Sam Altman asked her last September to be the voice of ChatGPT and again two days before last week's launch. The company has removed the voice, called 'Sky,' while insisting it was recorded by another actress.

Scarlett Johansson released a statement this evening saying that OpenAI approached her last September to be the voice of ChatGPT, that she declined for personal reasons, and that when she heard the voice the company demonstrated last week — the warm, slightly playful one called Sky — she was "shocked, angered and in disbelief" at how much it sounded like her. Sam Altman, she said, had contacted her agent two days before the launch to ask her to reconsider; before she could respond, the demo was out. Altman posted the word "her" on the day of the launch. Johansson played the AI in the 2013 film of that name.

OpenAI took the voice down yesterday and said today that it was recorded by a different professional actress, cast months before any contact with Johansson, and was never meant to imitate her. The company said it paused Sky "out of respect" for Johansson. It has not named the actress, and Johansson has hired lawyers.

Whether the voice is an imitation is, in the end, a question for a court, and the law here is not settled — Bette Midler won a case in 1988 against a company that used a sound-alike in a commercial. What is not in dispute is the sequence: an ask, a refusal, a launch, a one-word post, and a voice a lot of people mistook for the person who said no.

It's a small story compared with a lawsuit over training data, and it has traveled further than any of them, because everyone understands it. A company wanted a famous person's voice, didn't get permission, and produced something very close. That is the story people have been worried about since these tools appeared, told with a face they recognize.