A Movie About Sam Altman's Ouster and Wild Week at OpenAI Is Currently Filming. Here's Who's Portraying the Tech CEO (and His Nemesis, Elon Musk). Andrew Garfield is playing OpenAI cofounder and CEO Sam Altman.
By Erin Davis Edited by Sherin Shibu
Key Takeaways
- The firing (and quick rehiring) of OpenAI CEO Sam Altman in late 2023 will be portrayed on the big screen.
- The movie, which is being called "Artificial," does not yet have a release date.
- Social media users have been postings clips of the film shoots around San Francisco.
In November 2023, the board of ChatGPT-maker OpenAI fired its Chief Executive and cofounder, Sam Altman, after determining that he "was not consistently candid in his communications." The then-Chief Technology Officer, Mira Murati, was named interim CEO. Staff rebelled — 95% of the company signed a letter threatening to quit unless Altman was reinstated, and after a wild few days in the OpenAI offices (we imagine), Altman was back in the CEO role.
It's the kind of story that feels made for Hollywood — and now it will be, with a director and acting lineup that screams Oscar contender before the film is even in post-production. The movie has been shooting all over San Francisco this summer, per The San Francisco Standard.
The actors portraying Mira Murati and Sam Altman, Monica Barbaro and Andrew Garfield, attend day seven of the Wimbledon Tennis Championships at the All England Tennis and Croquet Club on July 06, 2025, in London, England.
Related: This New AI Startup Led By a Former OpenAI Exec Is Offering $500,000 Salaries
The film is being directed by Luca Guadagnino ("Call Me By Your Name," "After the Hunt"), and the cast is a who's who of awards show acting nominees: Andrew Garfield is playing Altman, Monica Barbaro plays Murati, and Ike Barinholtz is OpenAI cofounder and Altman nemesis, Elon Musk.
Puck got a hold of the screenplay and compares it to the 2010 mega-hit "The Social Network," a fictionalized take on the origins of Facebook. (The Garfield casting is a coincidence, we also imagine.)
Since those fateful few days, many cofounders have left OpenAI. Murati stepped down in 2024 and now heads Thinking Machine Lab, a secretive AI startup that has raised billions and is expected to announce a product in the next couple of months. Others have moved to Meta's AI teams.
Spotted Andrew Garfield, Monica Barbaro, and Yuri Borisov shooting Luca Guadagnino's Artificial in the streets of San Francisco. Andrew Garfield totally nails Sam Altman's walk! pic.twitter.com/NFk3HgtVTD
— V.L. Briwn is EDITING ?✍️ (@Arcofthesun7) August 1, 2025
