Netflix has tried generative AI in 300 programmes, executive tells Variety summit
Netflix has used generative AI in roughly 300 programmes, the streamer's senior director of creative innovation Girish Balakrishnan said during Variety's Entertainment and Tech Summit presented by EY, Variety reported on 18 September 2026.
The remark came in the session titled "Entertainment and Media in the Age of AI." The EY-presented summit includes several technology conversations, with this panel focused on film, television and media. Variety business editor Todd Spangler moderated the discussion, which brought together executives from studios, technology companies and advertising to talk through how the tools are used in production.
On stage were Google vice-president of technology and society Mira Line, Lionsgate chief AI officer Kathleen Grace, Hasbro Sixth Wall studio head Bertie Thomson, Teads senior vice-president of sales Annaka Vasquez, Adobe Pro Video head of business strategy Meagan Keane and Balakrishnan.
Much of the session dealt with confusion over the label AI. Line helped develop the "Human Generative Workflows" paper, led by producer Kathleen Kennedy and the American Film Institute and published in August 2026, which tries to set out how people and generative systems work together. Generative systems, in plain terms, are software that can create text, images, video and voices from prompts.
Keane laid out how Adobe divides its tools. "Assistive" features speed up routine edits. "Corrective" tools fix picture and sound problems. "Generative" functions create new material. The distinction matters for crews, because each type raises different questions about credit, consent and control.
Thomson described how Hasbro's AI-focused studio Sixth Wall has put proprietary guardrails around AI replicas of characters it licenses that use voice technology from ElevenLabs. Guardrails here mean built-in limits on what the system can do. The aim, he said, was to keep licensed characters within approved uses.
The panel followed a separate push to bring creators into the debate. The American Film Institute, in collaboration with Google, hosted the AFI AI Summit: Creators at the Center at its Los Angeles campus on 15 August 2026, according to AFI.
For viewers, this means the AI debate is less about machines replacing sets. It is about job-by-job decisions on editing, dubbing, voices and effects, and who signs off each step. That work is slower and more detailed than headlines suggest, and it is happening inside tools many editors already open every day.
