As you know, Bruce Willis announced a few months ago that he was suffering from a disease that forced him to hang up his boots and stop making movies. Something that, of course, saddened his legion of fans who have been following in his footsteps for more than three decades. Even so, and despite being retired, they still hold him responsible for small miracles that he himself was not aware of having performed. Like that of selling the image rights of future digital doubles created with Deepfake technologies.
Nothing to sell your face
The fact is that some time ago we learned that Bruce Willis had starred in a fun advertising spot in Russia, for the Megafon company, almost a year ago, which was made entirely thanks to Deepfake techniques by which an actor was later replaced by the face of the protagonist of The jungle of crystal. That was already news at the time because it meant that the interpreter himself left an important part of his image rights in the hands of others, but it was not the first step in anything related to the recurring marketing of his face as a resource to use. in any type of audiovisual content.
https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/1440531299387813888?s=20&t=nAz8LyCr82c_3pxx5SAAMg
Thus, it has been the agent of the actor himself who has gone to the media to denying that extreme that the image rights to perform digital doubles have been negotiated in that generic way. Even if there is such a thing. In statements to the BBC, a legal spokesperson for the interpreter came to confirm that there was "no partnership or agreement" with the company responsible for Deepfakes.
So things, Bruce Willis has not sold his image rights to anyone and, therefore, they continue to belong to him, so in the future it could be the case of repeating the experience of the Russian telephone company that used his face in this way, but through a specific agreement. Nothing of a great contract contemplating a future exploitation of the actor's face, so that news that he is the first to do it... turns out to be nothing at all.
Sidelined for speech problems
As you know, Bruce Willis reported almost six months ago that doctors had diagnosed him with aphasia, a speech disorder that prevents him from understanding and reproducing both spoken and written language and, therefore, he had no choice but to announce a premature retirement from the stage when he was barely 67 years old.
Although almost all of us remember him for his participation in the films of The jungle of crystal, His real claim to fame came with the mid-'80s television series Moonlight, which he starred with Cybill Shepherd and which was the one that really made him famous. Later they experienced successes such as Blind Date, comedy directed by Blake Edwards, or The jungle of crystal that confirmed the actor as one of the most successful of those years in Hollywood.
Although without a doubt, many of you will have him in your saints for hits like The sixth Sense... what if?