Chris Pratt pitched using an AI actor to play AI role in early Mercy casting talks: Not a 'good i...

The &34;Electric State&34; star says he also floated the idea of offering the part to Oprah: &34;It did not make sense.&34; Chris Pratt pitched using an AI actor to play AI role in early Mercy casting talks: Not a 'good idea' The &34;Electric State&34; star says he also floated the idea of offering the part to Oprah: &34;It did not make sense.&34; By Mike Miller Mike Miller Mike Miller is the executive editor on the movies team at . He previously worked as a writerreporter for PEOPLE and TMZ. EW's editorial guidelines January 22, 2026 2:00 p.m.

The "Electric State" star says he also floated the idea of offering the part to Oprah: "It did not make sense."

Chris Pratt pitched using an AI actor to play AI role in early Mercy casting talks: Not a 'good idea'

The "Electric State" star says he also floated the idea of offering the part to Oprah: "It did not make sense."

By Mike Miller

Mike Miller

Mike Miller is the executive editor on the movies team at . He previously worked as a writer-reporter for PEOPLE and TMZ.

EW's editorial guidelines

January 22, 2026 2:00 p.m. ET

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Chris Pratt in 'Mercy'. Credit:

Justin Lubin / Amazon MGM Studios

- Chris Pratt reveals that, very early in the casting process, he floated the idea of creating an AI actor to play the role of Judge Maddox in his new sci-fi thriller, *Mercy*.

- Pratt says he's glad the idea was immediately rejected and never came under serious consideration.

- Other early ideas for the role, which ultimately went to Rebecca Ferguson, included offering the part to Oprah Winfrey.

AI plays a big role in Chris Pratt's new sci-fi thriller, *Mercy* — but not as big as it could've.

Set in the not-too-distant future, the film stars Pratt as a homicide detective who's brought before an AI judge when he's accused of murdering his wife. Strapped to a metal chair in front of a large screen, he has 90 minutes to prove his innocence to the judge projected before him. If he fails to do so, he'll be executed on the spot.

While Rebecca Ferguson ended up playing the cool, calculated Judge Maddox, Pratt tells * *that, in very early casting discussions, he floated the idea of creating an actual AI actor to play the role.

"I remember talking about the various people who could play these characters, and early on, I was like, 'Should we have it be an AI, where the judge is actually AI, and we create an AI?' And everyone was like, 'No, I don't think so,'" he recalls.

Rebecca Ferguson in 'Mercy'.

Amazon/MGM Studios

"I was like, 'Yeah, I don't think that's a good idea at all," Pratt adds with a laugh. "So it was actually never a possibility any more than anything is a possibility when you're zeroing in on what the outcome is going to be and what the choices are that you're going to make. It's a collaborative effort."

The *Guardians of the Galaxy *star cracks up as he recalls another wild early idea.

"It's dumb, it's going to be dumb. It did not make sense, and I'm glad we didn't do it," he prefaces. "But one of my pitches early on was like, *What if [my character] could pick the judge, and I could pick Oprah, or I could pick anyone I want.* Because ultimately it's just a face on a [screen]. And I thought that would be funny to have Oprah do it."

Again, Pratt says he's glad this thought didn't come to fruition.

"It's like when you watch the deleted scenes, and you're like, 'Yeah, there's a good reason to delete that scene,'" he jokes.

Kali Reis and Chris Pratt in 'Mercy'.

Justin Lubin/Amazon MGM Studios

Not only would it have added "another layer of complication" to the production, but it also would've meant Ferguson wouldn't have been cast.

"She's so incredible in the film," he says. "Ultimately, the chance of doing Rebecca was like, 'Oh, that was perfect. She was a great piece of casting, because she's so striking, she's so beautiful, her face is so symmetrical that she almost looks like she's an AI."

At the beginning of the trial, Judge Maddox behaves with the kind of robotic detachment you'd expect from a supercomputer. But as the movie progresses, and she learns more about Pratt's Det. Raven, she appears to soften, and perhaps even empathize, with his predicament.

Asked if this was an intentional acting choice that he discussed with Ferguson, Pratt says, "Oh, yeah. It's funny, what ends up in the movie versus what you discuss in the collaborative rehearsal process. We spoke at length about her humanity, and at one point, we discussed the possibility that she was becoming more human than she wanted to let on because she knew she would be replaced or reprogrammed to be less human."

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He adds, "So it's as if she's immediately starting to hide who she is and, in that moment, becomes sentient…If something is intentionally deceiving to protect itself, then that, in a way, is like the germination of sentience."

These discussions helped the actors develop what would become Judge Maddox's character arc.

"We discussed at length how to create an arc for her," he explains. "My character certainly has an arc, but we wanted to know if she was also going to have an arc in terms of: Does she learn something? Does she become more? And she does. We wanted to make sure that we honored that, but without making it too human and still honoring the fact that it was an AI."

Chris Pratt in 'Mercy'.

Amazon MGM Studios

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While the rehearsal process was time-consuming, Pratt says it ultimately made the editing process quicker. "We rehearsed it often, almost like how you would rehearse a play where you figure out the beats and the tones in the rehearsal process, and then you lay the thing out," he says.

"A lot of times in acting, you can build off what you did previously," he continues. "You try something different. You give the editor 10 million options and let them create the movie they want to create in the post-production process. For us, we had a very streamlined vision of what we wanted it to be before we even shot it."

How'd it turn out? Judge for yourself when *Mercy* hits theaters this weekend.**

- Sci-Fi & Fantasy Movies

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Source: "EW Sci-Fi"

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Source: Sci-Fi

Published: January 22, 2026 at 02:38PM on Source: OPERA MAG

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