Nicolas Cage says he didn't sign Spider-Noir's AI waiver. The contract lets anyone refuse

On Saturday afternoon at New York Comic Con, seated on the Empire Stage with a handheld mic, Nicolas Cage was talking about how an actor stays relevant "in a very different world" when he asked the room a question of his own: "How do you survive AI?" His answer took about 29 seconds, and Variety's clip of it has since passed 1.5 million impressions on X.

In that clip, which we transcribed ourselves, Cage says: "Amazon is a very AI-friendly company to the tune of fifty billion dollars invested to OpenAI. I am not an AI-friendly actor." Then comes the line that matters: "I didn't sign the waiver to let them use AI on Spider-Noir." The Hollywood Reporter's transcript ends the thought with "I'm probably not going to be working with that studio again. But that's OK."

Plenty of actors have said they dislike AI. What is rare is a star of Cage's size saying on record that a production put a specific AI consent in front of him and that he left it unsigned. That makes this a story about paperwork, and the paperwork is something every performer and every producer working with performers can read.

Cage says Amazon asked, but Sony made the show

The weakest part of the story is the part the headlines lead with. Cage names Amazon, and nobody else has confirmed that Amazon asked for anything. Spider-Noir was "produced by Sony Pictures Television for MGM+ and Prime Video," according to Amazon MGM Studios' own press release of 25 April 2026, and the LA Times describes it as produced by both Sony Pictures Television and Amazon MGM Studios. Which company drafted the waiver, which one was Cage's employer on paper and what the document actually allowed are all unknown. Nobody has published it.

Amazon did not respond to the LA Times or THR on Saturday, and we found no statement from Amazon, Sony or SAG-AFTRA by Monday morning. So the accurate version is that Cage says he was asked to sign an AI waiver and did not, and that he blames Amazon.

The fifty billion dollars is real but slightly overstated. Amazon and OpenAI announced on 27 February that Amazon will invest $50 billion, starting with $15 billion up front and the remaining $35 billion when "certain conditions are met" (aboutamazon.com).

The outlets do not agree on his exact words either. Variety and the LA Times print "to let him use AI"; the clip says "them", as THR, Deadline and TheWrap have it. Variety also prints "connect those dots!" in the middle of the answer, a passage that is hard to make out over crowd noise in the clip and absent from THR's transcript.

What an AI waiver is under the 2026 contract

The 2026 SAG-AFTRA and AMPTP agreement, fully executed on 27 May, spells out what a digital replica consent has to look like. We read the text (Attachment D, which rewrites the Codified Basic Agreement's Section 64). A producer that scans a performer must get consent to create that replica, and the consent "must be clear and conspicuous" and either "separately signed or initialed by the performer" inside the employment contract or signed as a separate writing.

Using a replica in new material needs a second consent, with "a reasonably specific description of the intended use", under the same separate-signature rule. No consent is needed when footage stays "substantially as scripted, performed, and/or recorded". In plain terms, the clause is designed to be refusable without refusing the job, which is the point Cage's remark makes for every working actor.

Two caveats sit right beside that. A footnote takes customary digital work out of the use rules when the performer "is not recognizable (e.g., a masked character)", and Cage played the masked Spider, so some digital doubling of the character would never have needed his signature. We also do not know when he signed his deal. The 2026 text moves the effective date of these rules to 1 July 2026, and the 2023 contract, which has the same separate-consent structure, applied from 10 March 2024. Filming started around 3 October 2024.

Three years of the same position

This is not a new pose. In November 2023 Cage told the LA Times and WIRED that his Superman cameo in The Flash "was not what I did" on set, and he described likeness in contract terms: "We made an agreement. That is the linchpin." In July 2024, as Variety reported from his New Yorker interview, he cut the conversation short to "go get a scan done for the show", which Variety identified as Spider-Noir, and added: "God, I hope not AI. I'm terrified of that."

That scan matters for reading Saturday's line. He did give the production a body scan, so his refusal was most likely the separate consent to use a replica rather than a refusal to be scanned at all. That is our inference from the contract structure; Cage has not explained which document he declined. At the Saturn Awards in February 2025 he went further: "I am a big believer in not letting robots dream for us."

Amazon canceled Spider-Noir on 4 September after one season, heading into an Emmy weekend with 11 nominations, according to Variety. Some fans and Consequence have since linked the cancellation to the waiver. Cage did not make that link on Saturday, and nothing we found supports it.

What this means for anyone making work

In practice, for anyone making work this week, the useful lesson is that replica consent is a document with its own signature line, and it can be negotiated, narrowed or left blank. If you produce under a SAG-AFTRA agreement, you need that separate signature and a specific description of the use before a scan becomes new footage. If you are the performer, the contract already gives you the right Cage says he used.

• Put replica consent on its own page with a named, specific use. A vague "AI rights" clause is exactly what the 2026 text was written to stop.
• Keep scan consent and use consent apart in your paperwork, because the contract treats them as two decisions.
• Expect talent to ask about it in public. Cage just made the waiver a talking point at a fan convention, and casting conversations will follow.

There is a second, more surprising signal in the same answer. Cage said the filmmakers he wants to work with next are Gen Z directors coming up "through the YouTube culture", and he named Kane Parsons, the young maker behind the Backrooms videos. His words for that work were "from scratch and by hand". A Hollywood star is pointing at independent internet filmmakers as the future of his career, which is an opening for creators whatever tools they use, as long as the performance stays the performer's.

What is still unresolved

Nobody outside the production has seen the waiver, so its scope, its author and its date are open questions, as is whether any digital doubling of the masked Spider happened anyway. We heard Variety's 29-second clip, not the full panel. Cage also used the panel to say he will probably do a season of HBO's True Detective, which HBO has not confirmed. If Amazon or Sony responds, the first question is simple: what exactly did the waiver ask him to allow?

Timeline

• Date: Nov 2023. What happened: Cage says his Flash cameo "was not what I did"; "We made an agreement. That is the linchpin."; Source: LA Times; WIRED
• Date: Sun 10 Mar 2024. What happened: 2023 SAG-AFTRA digital replica consent rules take effect; Source: 2026 MOA, Attachment D
• Date: Mon 8 Jul 2024. What happened: Variety reports Cage's New Yorker remarks about a scan for the show; Source: Variety
• Date: Thu 3 Oct 2024. What happened: Spider-Noir filming begins (approximate); Source: ComingSoon
• Date: Sun 2 Feb 2025. What happened: Saturn Awards speech: "not letting robots dream for us"; Source: Variety
• Date: Fri 27 Feb 2026. What happened: Amazon commits $50 billion to OpenAI, $15 billion up front; Source: aboutamazon.com
• Date: Mon 25 May 2026. What happened: Spider-Noir premieres on MGM+; Prime Video follows on Wed 27 May; Source: Amazon MGM release
• Date: Wed 27 May 2026. What happened: 2026 SAG-AFTRA and AMPTP agreement fully executed; Source: amptp.org
• Date: Wed 1 Jul 2026. What happened: Effective date for the 2026 replica rules; Source: 2026 MOA, Attachment D
• Date: Fri 4 Sep 2026. What happened: Amazon cancels Spider-Noir after one season; Source: Variety
• Date: Sat 10 Oct 2026. What happened: NYCC Spotlight panel: the waiver remarks; Source: Variety clip on X; THR; Deadline
• Date: Mon 12 Oct 2026. What happened: No statement from Amazon, Sony or SAG-AFTRA found; Source: Our check

Sources and what is unconfirmed: Variety's clip on X (10 October, transcribed by us) and its write-up; The Hollywood Reporter, Deadline, the LA Times and TheWrap (10 October); the 2026 SAG-AFTRA and AMPTP agreement (amptp.org); Amazon MGM Studios' 25 April release; Variety on the cancellation (4 September), the New Yorker remarks (8 July 2024) and the Saturn speech (3 February 2025); WIRED and the LA Times (November 2023); aboutamazon.com (27 February 2026); X API counts pulled 12 October. The waiver itself is unpublished, Amazon as the party that asked is Cage's own claim, and "connect those dots" is attributed to Variety only. We did not contact Cage, Amazon or Sony for this draft.

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