Will Smith eating spaghetti
In plain wordsA grotesque 2023 AI-generated video of actor Will Smith eating spaghetti that became a meme and an informal yardstick: each new video model is judged by how well it redoes the scene.
A short AI-generated clip, and the informal benchmark it became, showing a distorted likeness of the actor Will Smith devouring spaghetti. The original, made with an early open-source text-to-video modeltext-to-video model, n.: An AI that creates a short video clip — increasingly with matching sound — from a written description, such as 'a paper boat sailing down a rainy street'., featured melting faces, warped hands and noodles that defied physics, epitomizing the uncanny state of video generation at the time. Because the prompt was so widely recognized, users re-ran it on each new video model as a visible measure of progress in realism, motion coherence and, later, synchronized sound, producing a side-by-side record of the technology's rapid improvement from 2023 onward. The clip is also a reference point in debates over likeness rights and celebrity deepfakesdeepfake, n.: A fake but realistic video, photo or voice recording made with AI that puts words in a real person's mouth or shows them in a scene that never happened..
The new model's Will Smith eating spaghetti is indistinguishable from footage, chewing sounds included.
Origin
Posted in late March 2023 by the Reddit user chaindrop to the r/StableDiffusion forum, generated with the ModelScope text-to-video model; a repost on Twitter reached millions of views within days. In February 2024, after users challenged OpenAI to recreate it with its Sora model, Will Smith posted a parody video of himself eating spaghetti in an exaggeratedly 'AI' manner.
Usage note
Comparable informal yardsticks include pelican on a bicyclepelican on a bicycle, n.: A joke test in which an AI model is asked to draw, by writing code, a pelican riding a bicycle; comparing the results became a popular, lighthearted way to judge each new model. for language models and hand rendering for image models (see AI handsAI hands, n.: The tendency of early AI image generators to draw hands badly — extra or missing fingers, twisted joints — which became a running joke and a quick way to spot fake images.).
Related
- text-to-video modeltext-to-video model, n.: An AI that creates a short video clip — increasingly with matching sound — from a written description, such as 'a paper boat sailing down a rainy street'.
- pelican on a bicyclepelican on a bicycle, n.: A joke test in which an AI model is asked to draw, by writing code, a pelican riding a bicycle; comparing the results became a popular, lighthearted way to judge each new model.
- AI handsAI hands, n.: The tendency of early AI image generators to draw hands badly — extra or missing fingers, twisted joints — which became a running joke and a quick way to spot fake images.
- SoraSora, prop. n.: OpenAI's video-generating AI, unveiled in 2024 with startlingly realistic clips; a 2025 version added sound and a social app, but OpenAI shut the service down in 2026.
- deepfakedeepfake, n.: A fake but realistic video, photo or voice recording made with AI that puts words in a real person's mouth or shows them in a scene that never happened.
- uncanny valleyuncanny valley, n.: The eerie feeling people get from robots, dolls or computer-made faces that look almost, but not quite, human: liking grows with human likeness, then suddenly plunges.
Mentioned in
AI handsAI hands, n.: The tendency of early AI image generators to draw hands badly — extra or missing fingers, twisted joints — which became a running joke and a quick way to spot fake images., Heart on My SleeveHeart on My Sleeve, prop. n.: A 2023 song that used AI to imitate the voices of Drake and The Weeknd without their involvement; it went viral before being pulled, becoming a landmark case for AI voice cloning in music., pelican on a bicyclepelican on a bicycle, n.: A joke test in which an AI model is asked to draw, by writing code, a pelican riding a bicycle; comparing the results became a popular, lighthearted way to judge each new model.