Sonantic Voice Technology and New IP Rights Concerns

Top Gun: Maverick (“Maverick”) shattered box office expectations for Memorial Day weekend with a take of $154 million. The second Maverick story that made headlines, however, was Val Kilmer’s return to the sequel despite a very public battle with throat cancer that had robbed him of his original speaking voice in 2015. Technology startup, Sonantic, played a huge role in his return by recreating Kilmer’s original speaking voice to be used for dialogue in the film.

Sonantic Voice Technology and IP Concerns

Since 2020, Sonantic has collaborated with Kilmer to recreate or synthesize Kilmer’s speaking voice for his return to the big screen. Kilmer supplied Sonantic with hours of archival footage of himself from movies, but ultimately Sonantic could only use approximately half an hour of footage of Kilmer due to film licensing issues. Eventually, Sonantic created a text-to-speech program of Kilmer himself. Imagine an incredibly realistic Alexa or Siri voice, except it’s Kilmer and the voice can reflect changes in inflection, intensity, tone, and projection. Basically, the program’s cloning of Kilmer’s voice can mimic emotion.

But with Sonantic’s breakthrough voice technology came accompanying intellectual property concerns. Currently, no state or federal law directly addresses the synthesis, cloning, or recreation of a person’s voice. Generally, similar legal challenges have been filed under theories of copyright or right to publicity. Noteworthy cases have found courts siding with celebrities like Bette Midler or Tom Waits, but these cases addressed impersonators mimicking their sound or appearance for commercial purposes. By contrast, Sonantic’s voice technology has been marketed as giving actors like Kilmer a return to a lucrative stream of revenue, noting that others can use it for passive income.  But does that mean Sonantic would get a cut?

Sonantic Voice Technology and Copyrights

Kilmer assumedly only owns a license to this particular version of the technology, and what the program creates arguably does not qualify as a performance or work created by Kilmer. Some would argue there is an intentionality to art or performance that does not exist if it is an engine or artificial intelligence creating it. Moreover, with the intervention of technology, the lineage of rights that would presumably flow to heirs or surviving spouses becomes distorted. For example, Ottavia Bourdain, the widow of late celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain, recently spoke out against a documentary that used technology (not Sonantic’s) to have Bourdain seemingly “speak” three new lines for the piece. And what if the recreated voices are used for parody purposes? Then the line is further blurred if the doctrine of fair use is invoked.

In the end, however, it is clear that the latest technological innovation of creating voice engines that mimic or clone a celebrity voice has raised new issues regarding celebrity likeness, rights to privacy, and copyright. Further complicating the issue is the doctrine of fair use, the idea of performance, and what constitutes protectible works under existing statutes. As such, it behooves entertainment and intellectual property counsel alike to consider such implications as technology continues to be increasingly used to recreate, replace, or supplement celebrity performances in media.

Key Takeaways on Sonantic Voice Technology and IP Rights

Legal concerns have arisen with the recent demonstration of voice synthesis and recreation in Top Gun: Maverick where actor Val Kilmer’s voice was digitally recreated by Sonantic to speak new dialogue. New issues include:

• Whether the new work would belong to the actor or the technology company;

• Whether the creation of new works could be defended under fair use if used for parody; and

• Whether such rights could flow to heirs.

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