Hollywood's Death By Algorithm w/ Justine Bateman

Conversations with Coleman

The Free Press

Philosophy, Society & Culture

4.5 • 614 Ratings

🗓️ 28 July 2025

⏱️ 62 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Filmmaker and digital rights activist Justine Bateman joins me for a conversation on how AI is warping Hollywood and why the content we consume feels increasingly hollow. We dive into the decline of originality, the studios' addiction to algorithms, and how the “double-screen” era (watching while scrolling) has rewired audience expectations, pushing creators toward louder, faster, and shallower stories. Can art survive the attention economy? A special thanks to our sponsors: Go to groundnews.com/Coleman to get 40% off the unlimited access Vantage plan and unlock world-wide perspectives on today’s biggest news stories. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to another episode of Conversations with Coleman. My guest today is Justine Bateman.
0:06.3	Justine is a filmmaker, author, and former actress who rose to fame as Mallory Keaton on the hit 80s
0:12.4	sitcom Family Ties. In recent years, she's moved behind the camera, making her directorial
0:18.4	debut in 2021 with the movie Violet. She's also published books on
0:22.8	fame and aging. In this episode, we talk about fame and its impact on identity. We talk about
0:29.0	the influence of streaming platforms on the film industry. We talk about the role of Gen AI in
0:34.2	creative fields. We discuss the societal shift towards digital interactions and much more.
0:40.0	So without further ado,
0:41.8	Justine Bateman.
0:52.2	Justine Bateman.
0:53.2	Thank you so much for coming on my show.
0:55.9	Yeah, really pleased to be here.
0:58.5	So, you know, many, many people will be familiar with you all the way back from the 1980s.
1:08.1	And there's so many different places we can start, but you've written very interesting work about what it's like to be famous,
1:16.4	kind of bringing the normal person into the point of view of someone that goes through the entire life cycle of fame in a way that is quite rare.
1:27.3	You've also written and directed a film called Violet,
1:32.5	which I watched yesterday in preparation for this. And so a lot of different places to start,
1:38.6	but let's, let's, I guess, start from what's kind of more recent, which is your political commentary.
1:46.9	Some people may have seen you on Fox in the past a few months.
1:52.7	They may have seen you in other places talking about partisan politics and so forth.
1:57.8	I'm curious, what was your journey from, you know, actor, director to a public
2:05.4	commentator on political issues? Well, I'm not an actor. It was a fantastic career long in the
	...

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