Mrs. Davis: How The Creators Actually Utilized AI In The Writers Room
The upcoming Peacock series "Mrs. Davis" is an interesting intersection of faith and technology. Created by Damon Lindelof and Tara Hernandez, the show predominately follows a character known as Simone (Betty Gilpin), a nun that soon finds herself constantly badgered by different people all wanting the same thing. The trailer for "Mrs. Davis" blends dark comedy, satire, and some action scenes that see Simone embark on a quest to find the Holy Grail while at the same time being beset by different factions with opposing views on the usage of artificial intelligence.
Speaking of artificial intelligence, it seems as if the creators of "Mrs. Davis" have ironically chosen to utilize A.I. in the show's production. During a panel at the film festival South by Southwest, Lindelof mentioned how they used artificial intelligence and said, "We thought it would be fun to build an A.I. that would title our episodes, and that we just basically said that whatever it comes up with, we have to stick to as long as it is appropriate for whatever barometers of appropriateness exist."
Lindelof and the rest of the Mrs. Davis crew learned a lot about A.I. for their efforts
Damon Lindelof continued and explained that in the process of creating the A.I. that would title episodes for the upcoming "Mrs. Davis," the artificial intelligence struggled to understand what a title actually was, despite the information that was filtered through the program. Lindelof then said that the entire production crew learned a great deal about algorithms and how A.I. works while attempting to get it to generate episode titles. In the end, Lindelof and the rest of the crew were quite happy with the results, noting that Episode 7 is titled "Great Gatsby: 2001: A Space Odyssey."
In an interview with Vulture, Lindelof spoke about "Mrs. Davis" and how he enjoys losing the audience and drawing them immediately back into the story. He elaborated, "Part of the game in a show like this, and in storytelling in general, is to play into the audience's expectations. You have to lean in extra hard if you're going to try to subvert them. Hopefully, it will be really exciting if people get that far."
Whatever Lindelof is alluding to is sure to be a massive shock, considering his history with shows like HBO's vaunted "Watchmen" and the pause-worthy "Lost," and how he will merge religion and artificial intelligence is sure to blur a few lines in "Mrs. Davis," much like their title-generating program.