Ardisson speaks with the dead

The universe of virtuality continues to grow in the arts and the media. A hint of this is the new show presented by French host and producer Thierry Ardisson. After having interviewed almost all the French personalities, the man in black now prefers to submit his questions to those who are dead and whom he resurrects.

In hotel of time, which took off on Monday evening on France 3, Ardisson creates the illusion of a long documentary interview with legends that the French public wants to see relive. And who better to launch this concept than Dalida, icon among icons, who died 35 years ago.

Thanks to technological prowess, the singer’s admirers have seen and heard her answer the questions of the host who went to meet her in a room of this famous hotel of time, actually Le Meurice, a sumptuous palace in Paris.

If the screenplay and acting of the actress who hides under the face of Dalida are disappointing (the lack of naturalness in the questions and answers is sometimes annoying), the technical aspect and the production of the program are absolutely impressive.

This process, based on the principle of deepfake (video or audio recording modified using artificial intelligence), was developed by the Mac Guff studio. Called Face Retriever, it blends the face of a personality, in this case Dalida, with that of an actress.

As for the voice, it was recreated by specialists from the Institute for Research and Acoustic/Music Coordination (IRCAM). The result is stunning. The sound of the voice was heard in Orlando, Dalida’s brother. This one could not disentangle the true from the false.

If Dalida has been entirely recreated, you should know that her words are authentic. We use statements she made during the thousands of interviews granted during her career. At the very end, Ardisson makes him tell his suicide of May 3, 1987 from information gathered after the tragedy. Disturbing moment…

So far, three episodes have been shot. French viewers will soon see Coluche and Jean Gabin (who makes a short appearance in the episode of Dalida). Ardisson (rejuvenated 20 years by Face Retriever for his meeting with the singer) hopes to create other episodes.

This emission, one suspects it well, is very expensive to produce. For each episode, it takes a month of research, a month of writing, three days of filming, two weeks of editing and a final month for special effects.

There is no image rights for the dead. Even if he was not obliged to do so, Thierry Ardisson still asked permission from the heirs of his guests. Coluche’s entourage refused the first version of the script, but approved the second.

This is not the first time that Ardisson has had the fantasy of interviewing the dead. Several years ago, he had done the same thing with look-alikes of John Lennon or Victor Hugo. But this time, he took the time to develop a concept that is already making a lot of ink flow. The press coverage given to this program over the past few days has been enormous.

Qualified as a “television UFO” by the chroniclers, this program fascinates as much as it disturbs. Monday, on social networks, the comments were very numerous. The vast majority of people said they were flabbergasted by this concept. The term “bluffing” came up often. But some have expressed unease at seeing a dead woman being interviewed.

After the ghost of Elvis came to do a duet with Céline, after these Japanese stars offering concerts in the form of a hologram, after the “ABBAtars” tour of the four members of ABBA recreated in 3D (the tour should start on May 27 at London), here are missing guests who come to tell us what they have already said in a sublimated setting.

You will tell me that the exploitation of the virtual in the world of the arts does not go back to yesterday. Michel Lemieux and Victor Pilon have often exploited this in their creations. But this sophisticated use of deepfake in a documentary interview opens up unprecedented possibilities for the film and television industry.

Why struggle to find an actress who looks like Marilyn Monroe when you can recreate the real Marilyn Monroe? Why kill yourself to rejuvenate an actor for flashback scenes when you can take 15 or 30 years off him by deepfake ?

All of this is very interesting. But there is this game with truth and lies that is scary.

A woman on Twitter asked this after watching the show yesterday: “So does that mean you can make anyone say anything? Yes, ma’am, we can do that! However, I wanted to tell him that this thing has been possible for a long time. No need to deepfake for that.

I see these new phenomena emerging with a mixture of fascination and concern. I tell myself that it will be more and more difficult to disentangle the true from the false. Or if you prefer: it will be easier to make fake.

I also fear that we lose over time the pleasure of dreams and fantasies, the real ones.

But above all, I always wonder about the good use that we will make of these tools. Because for every creator who wants to dazzle, there will be an idiot who wants to fool and mystify.

Ardisson wants to make people dream. He wants to have fun. At least with him the convention is clear.

Nevertheless, I would have liked him to ask Dalida, she who was so close to Mitterrand, what she thought of the recent presidential election.