Stéphanie FournierAs Hacks wraps its landmark five-season run on HBO Max with a May 28, 2026 finale, star Hannah Einbinder has made news for far more than her Emmy-nominated performance. In April 2026, Einbinder publicly called AI creators "losers" who are "trying to rob real creative people of our gifts" — and in Canada, her words land with uncomfortable precision: Canadian performers currently have almost no legal protections against AI replicating their voice, face, or likeness.
What Hannah Einbinder Said — and Why Canadian Performers Should Care
At press events for Hacks Season 5, Einbinder described AI creators as people who "have always wanted to be special" and resort to AI because "they're not artists." Season 5 of the show tackles artificial intelligence directly, weaving the debate into storylines that mirror real industry tensions.
Her remarks resonated because they named a fear shared by actors, musicians, and content creators worldwide: that their faces, voices, and performances could be cloned by AI systems — without consent and without compensation. In the United States, studios agreed after the 2023 SAG-AFTRA strike that they would not use an actor's digital image or likeness without consent and agreed-upon pay. In Canada, no equivalent statutory protection yet exists.
For the thousands of Canadian performers who have never headlined an HBO series, the absence of legal protection is not a theoretical concern — it is an immediate contractual risk.
The Legal Gap: What ACTRA Has Been Fighting For
ACTRA — the Alliance of Canadian Cinema, Television and Radio Artists — has been vocal about the shortfall in performer protections. The union has advocated for three core rights that Canadian performers do not currently have guaranteed by statute:
- The right to consent before their voice, image, or likeness is used to train or generate AI outputs
- The right to compensation when their performance is reproduced or synthesized by an AI system
- "Personality rights" that protect a performer's name and likeness from unauthorized commercial exploitation
As of May 2026, Canada's Copyright Act does not specifically address AI-generated replicas of real individuals. ACTRA has noted that performers have been known to give away their rights without fully understanding the implications, and that "there's effectively very little protection for creator rights" under current Canadian law.
This means a streaming platform or production company could, in theory, train an AI on a Canadian actor's past performances and generate new synthetic "performances" without paying them a cent. The legal tools to stop this simply do not yet exist in Canadian statute.
Canada's Government Has Consulted — But Not Yet Acted
The Government of Canada has acknowledged the problem. Innovation, Science and Economic Development Canada (ISED) launched a formal consultation on copyright in the age of generative AI, and the resulting What We Heard report confirmed that performers and content creators were among the most urgent voices demanding stronger protections. Multiple stakeholders called for new personality rights legislation during the consultation process.
However, as of May 2026, no new law has passed. Canada is "preparing new rules" on how copyright holders should be compensated when AI systems train on their work — but the legislation has not yet been tabled. In the meantime, Canadian performers are navigating a significant legal grey zone every time they sign a new contract.
Who Is Affected Beyond Famous Actors
The Einbinder debate is headline-grabbing because she is a recognizable face. But the same issue touches thousands of Canadian performers at every career level:
- Voice actors whose recorded performances could be ingested by text-to-speech AI systems
- Background performers whose faces might be used to populate AI-generated crowd sequences
- Dancers and stunt performers whose physical motion data could train movement AI
- Independent musicians and podcasters whose vocal patterns could be cloned and repurposed
Unlike a major production with a full legal team, most Canadian performers sign contracts without realizing what rights they are granting. A clause that allows "all rights in perpetuity" or "synthetic and digital media uses" could legally permit a producer to feed your likeness into an AI pipeline indefinitely.
Three Practical Steps Canadian Performers Should Take Now
While national AI legislation catches up, performers can act under existing legal frameworks.
Review every contract clause related to digital or synthetic media. Before signing, look carefully for language about "digital likeness," "AI training data," "synthetic performance," or "perpetual rights." If these clauses appear, negotiate their scope or seek removal. An entertainment lawyer can identify which clauses are standard industry language and which are unusually expansive.
Register your creative work where possible. Canada's Copyright Act does extend to original recorded performances. Registering formal copyright claims creates a documented legal record that can be useful in any future dispute over unauthorized AI use.
Document how your existing work is being used. Keep copies of past contracts, recordings, and screen appearances. If an AI-generated version of you surfaces somewhere without consent, thorough documentation of the original work is foundational evidence for any legal action.
The Moment to Consult a Lawyer Is Before You Sign
The window for meaningful protection is before the next contract — not after a clause has already been agreed to. Entertainment lawyers in Canada who specialize in performer rights are actively helping clients audit existing agreements and add protective language to future deals.
Hannah Einbinder's AI stand is a reminder that the legal fight over creative ownership is happening in real time. For Canadian performers — whether you're appearing on a national commercial or signing with an independent podcast network — understanding your rights before you sign could be the difference between controlling your career and losing your likeness to an algorithm.
This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal advice. Consult a qualified entertainment lawyer for guidance specific to your situation.
