AI Character Tilly Norwood Breaks into Chinese During Live TV Interview

The AI-generated character Tilly Norwood, promoted as the world's first such actress, switched to Mandarin mid-reply on Piers Morgan's programme, interrupting her dialogue with veteran actor Tom Conti before returning to English.

London-based production firm Particle6 and its AI talent division Xicoia developed the photorealistic character. Dutch producer Eline van der Velden heads both companies.

Glitch Occurred During Morgan Interview

Conti asked if the other performers in Norwood's debut film were actual people or computer creations. She replied in English, then continued in Chinese for several seconds, afterward calling it a minor problem and reverting to English.

Piers Morgan Uncesored released the two-minute clip on Friday to promote the full episode. Norwood's social media account did not apologise but instead joked about speaking over 30 languages and directed users to a paid chat service.

Actors Unions Opposed Norwood from the Start

Norwood made her first public appearance at the Zurich Film Festival in 2025 and was given a role in Misaligned, a film about a synthetic being that is persuaded to adopt human desires by a rogue artificial intelligence.

SAG-AFTRA, the union for American screen actors, rejected the idea when Norwood first emerged.

"Tilly Norwood" is not an actor, it's a character generated by a computer program that was trained on the work of countless professional performers, without permission or compensation," wrote SAG-AFTRA.

The union, formally named the Screen Actors Guild and American Federation of Television and Radio Artists, represents roughly 160,000 members such as actors, broadcasters, voice artists and stunt performers. It negotiates base pay and work conditions that studios must offer.

Van der Velden refers to Norwood as an artistic creation rather than a substitute for a human. Actress Emily Blunt urged talent agencies to cut ties with the project.

Emily Blunt says AI "actress" Tilly Norwood is "really scary" and warns Hollywood agencies: "Don't do that." "I don't know how to [talk about it] other than to say how terrifying this is. Are you serious? That's an AI? Good Lord, we're screwed. That is really, really scary, Come…"

— Variety (@Variety) September 29, 2025

This incident occurs as synthetic media continues to have public mishaps. BeInCrypto reported in July that Coinbase was criticized for an AI hallucination that released a World Cup result before the match started.

Investment continues nonetheless, with AI video startup funding pushing one company to a $5.4 billion valuation last month.

The decision to include the Mandarin segment in the broadcast will reveal how much unedited Norwood footage the studio wants the audience to see.