There was only ever one genuine, unique, authentic George Carlin, and an attempt to re-create his comedy genius via an artificial-intelligence (AI) created copy has been slammed by one person who would know that better than anyone else – his daughter Kelly.
Kelly Carlin revealed she was underwhelmed after the airing of an hour-long special from Dudesy, a podcast run by artificial intelligence, that sought to reinvent his unique humor and social commentary some 15 years after he died.
“No machine will ever replace his genius,” she said, as first reported by Rolling Stone.
The outlet details in its report the AI Carlin creation begins with an explainer, with Dudesy clarifying its fake, recreated offering.
“What you’re about to hear is not George Carlin,” it announces, adding in order to nail the comedian’s style it “listened to all of George Carlin’s material and did my best to imitate his voice, cadence and attitude as well as the subject matter I think would have interested him today.”
George Carlin appears on The Hollywood Palace – Airdate: December 19, 1966. (ABC Photo Archives/Disney General Entertainment Content via Getty)
Following the video’s release on YouTube, Kelly Carlin took to social media on Wednesday evening to publicly respond via an X (formerly Twitter) thread, stating:
My statement regarding the AI generated George Carlin special: My dad spent a lifetime perfecting his craft from his very human life, brain and imagination. No machine will ever replace his genius. These AI generated products are clever attempts at trying to recreate a mind that will never exist again.
Let’s let the artist’s work speak for itself. Humans are so afraid of the void that we can’t let what has fallen into it stay there.
When one X user asked Carlin’s daughter if “this clown had permission,” Kelly reposted the question and wrote, “ZERO PERMISSION GRANTED.”
As the Rolling Stone report further notes, Kelly offered Carlin fans and lovers of comedy another idea: “how about we give some actual living human comedians a listen to? But if you want to listen to the genuine George Carlin, he has 14 specials that you can find anywhere.”
The late George Carlin’s comedy career began as half of a duo with Jack Burns and then performed clean bits on TV variety shows in the ’60s.
In the ’70s, Carlin evolved into the raunchy standup who’d talk about the seven words you cannot say on television.
File/American comedian George Carlin performs onstage at the Northern Illinois University (NIU) Fieldhouse, DeKalb, Illinois, February 26, 1972. ( Chuck Fishman/Getty Images)
His material frequently addressed religion and political issues like abortion while offering broad social overviews of the day.
Carlin’s evolution encompassed drug use and family discord, touching on his addiction to cocaine, and his wife, Brenda Carlin’s, alcoholism. She died in 1997 of liver cancer.
George Carlin died of heart failure in 2008 at age 71.