Hollywood has spent the past year bracing for AI. On Tuesday, Sept. 29, nearly 400 creators, AI experts, marketers, and brands filled UCLA’s Freud Theater to talk about how they’re already putting it to work at the first AI Creator Day from What’s Trending and TheWrap.
“AI Creator Day proved that while there’s a lot of understandable fear and uncertainty around AI, there’s also a huge community of people who want to learn, create and build together,” said What’s Trending founder and CEO Shira Lazar, who co-hosted the event with TheWrap founder and CEO Sharon Waxman a day ahead of TheGrill 2026.
“People don’t just want to hear what AI might mean for the future. They want to be part of shaping it.”
The business is already moving
FoxNXT head Jon Flynn said he recently sat in on a feature pitch with AI tools written into the budget. The filmmakers expected to save about 15% and wanted to spend it on location shoots. Flynn said the real gain is time, and that no tool replaces 20 years of industry experience.
Stability AI CEO Prem Akkaraju told Lazar that licensing is what opened doors in music. Stability built its audio model on fully licensed material, which helped it land deals with Sony, Universal and Warner while much of the music business still resists AI.
UTA’s Oren Rosenbaum told TheWrap’s Kayla Cobb that legacy media trusts creators more than ever, pointing to UTA clients whose podcasts now stream on Netflix.
Drawing the line on what’s human
Adobe’s Karen Robinson compared the stigma around AI-assisted work to the early backlash against Photoshop, arguing that editing in Lightroom shouldn’t earn content an “AI generated” label. Rebecca Grone of 11:11 Media laid out the cost of getting it wrong. Her team’s work with Paris Hilton on “Searching for Mr. Deepfake” has identified more than 105,000 sexually explicit deepfakes and removed about 62,000, with tens of thousands still online.
IAB’s James Douglas gave brands a simple rule. Disclose it.
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Creators are hedging early
Comedian Vincent Marcus, who also does voice acting, said he’s preparing for that work to dry up and is building AI characters on Cantina in the meantime. YouTube veteran DeStorm Power argued the backlash against AI mirrors the early skepticism around YouTube, driven by fear of what people don’t yet understand. Rebecca Zamolo and Matt Slays use AI dubbing to reach Spanish-speaking fans, though they admitted they have no clean answer for protecting their young daughter’s likeness.
The most affecting moment came from Jenny Stojkovic, co-host of “The AI Download,” who previewed a documentary she’s making with her father, who is blind, about how voice AI could help blind people leave their homes. Don Allen III of Asteria Research and Technology offered the clearest answer to AI’s critics. Make better stories.
