Andrew Garfield addresses Oscar buzz as Artificial brings OpenAI saga to London

Andrew Garfield says he is proud of Artificial and flattered by the early awards talk as Luca Guadagnino's OpenAI drama reached London.

Garfield spoke to Variety on the red carpet at the film's London Film Festival premiere on Sunday, 11 October. The screening followed its world premiere at the New York Film Festival. It played as a gala title in London's 70th edition, with the festival's ticket page listing the screening as sold out.

The film dramatises five chaotic days in 2023 when OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman was fired and then rehired. Guadagnino directs from a script credited to Simon Rich. Garfield plays Altman. Yura Borisov plays OpenAI co-founder Ilya Sutskever, Monica Barbaro plays former chief technology officer Mira Murati, Ike Barinholtz plays Elon Musk and Mark Rylance plays Geoffrey Hinton.

Awards talk started in New York. Garfield, twice Oscar-nominated without a win, is campaigning in supporting actor for this role. Borisov, who was previously nominated for the supporting actor Oscar for Anora, is campaigning in lead actor. That split has already put Garfield's name into early 2027 Oscars predictions published by Variety.

The road to cinemas has been unusual. Amazon MGM Studios dropped the film in June, and Neon then picked it up for distribution, according to Variety. The change came shortly after Amazon invested $50 billion in OpenAI. Altman has said he did not speak to anyone at Amazon, including Jeff Bezos, about the decision to drop the film.

There was one strange overlap between life and shoot. Parts of the film were shot outside Altman's own house. Garfield said he does not recall seeing Altman during that work.

For audiences, this means a short wait. Artificial is set for a United States theatrical release on Christmas Day, 25 December 2026, according to Deadline. London got an early festival look. Everyone else gets the full rollout in December.