Demis Hassabis and Darren Aronofsky met in 1999 when they were invited to speak at the Institute of Contemporary Arts in London about the future of storytelling. At the time, Hassabis was a video game developer; today he is CEO of Google’s DeepMind AI lab and a Nobel laureate in chemistry. Aronofsky had released his debut feature Pi in 1998 and would go on to direct the Oscar-winning Black Swan and The Whale. Now, his new film company, Primordial Soup, is joining forces with Hassabis and DeepMind to produce short narrative films using AI. Three are already in the works.

Demis, why is using AI in filmmaking interesting to you?

Demis Hassabis: It stems from my games background. I started by doing game design and programming. That’s how I got into AI, actually. I love this fusion of technology enabling creativity. During the golden era of games in the 1990s, we were exploring a whole new art form, one which fused the best of technology with the best of design. We didn’t just make games, we were inventing whole new genres, such as the best-selling simulation game Theme Park which I co-designed and programmed in 1994, aged 17. I see the work I’m doing now with AI and these AI tools that we’re building [being used] for creativity.