{"id":810,"date":"2026-04-30T15:56:30","date_gmt":"2026-04-30T15:56:30","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/projects.etc.cmu.edu\/act-vi\/?p=810"},"modified":"2026-04-30T16:03:16","modified_gmt":"2026-04-30T16:03:16","slug":"week-16-apr-27-2026-may-1-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/projects.etc.cmu.edu\/act-vi\/week-16-apr-27-2026-may-1-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Week 16 (Apr. 27, 2026 – May. 1, 2026)"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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Closing the Curtain on ACT VI<\/span><\/span><\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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Act VI Final Presentation<\/figcaption>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/figure>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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Finals week was an emotional rollercoaster for our team. There was excitement, fear, anxiety about our final presentation, and also a deep sense of joy in realizing how far we had come throughout the semester. Over the weekend, we spent time refining our presentation, polishing our flow, and rehearsing together.<\/p>

To present our findings, we created a final performance framed as a fantasy adventure: a group of knights entering a mysterious cave in search of answers. Inside the cave lived \u201cwild A.I. with Theater inside it,\u201d and our quest – given by King Mo of Animatia and Queen Brenda of Dramatica – was to discover whether AI could truly belong in live performance without becoming a gimmick.<\/p>

The presentation took the audience through our journey of experimentation, failures, discoveries, and ultimately, a clearer understanding of what AI can and cannot do as a performer. We loosely drew inspiration from Monty Python\u2019s Holy Grail \u201cKiller Bunny\u201d scene<\/a>, adding humor and theatricality to the structure. Each team member presented a different area of exploration, including prompt design, emotional expressiveness, human-in-the-loop systems, and puppetry.<\/p>

We ended with a more philosophical reflection: how much being human matters in live theater – the ability to feel, connect, and relate to emotional experiences in ways that AI still cannot replicate.<\/p>

We presented in front of faculty, staff, students, and guests at 1:50 PM on April 28th, 2026. Our presentation was filled with laughter and genuine audience engagement, which is somewhat unusual for ETC presentations (at least that’s what we were told). We concluded with three thoughtful questions from faculty members, followed by an overwhelming amount of positive feedback.<\/p>

Many people described the presentation as surprising, energetic, and a courageous opening that woke everyone up after a long day of watching presentations. Our instructors, Mo and Brenda, later shared faculty feedback with us and mentioned that this was one of the strongest sets of feedback, comments, and survey charts they had seen – especially for such a challenging project. The praise continued for two full days, which made us feel that we had created something truly unique while still staying grounded in our goal of sharing honest findings and meaningful learnings.<\/p>

Later that week, on Wednesday, April 29th, we held our final playthrough sessions from 9:30 AM to 12:00 PM. Vivian, along with a guest, Ruth, and several ETC friends visited to interact with our AI characters through our simple UI. Watching people engage with the system reminded us of the fun and curiosity that first inspired the project – people genuinely enjoyed the experience.<\/p>

That same day was also Community Day at ETC, where students spent time together eating, crafting, drawing with chalk, playing board games, and enjoying outdoor activities like frisbee. It was a much-needed moment of celebration and reflection after such an intense semester.<\/p>

On Thursday at 3 PM, we had our final post-mortem meeting with Mo and Brenda. We reflected on the full journey of the project – what worked well, what could have been improved, and the biggest lessons we learned throughout the semester.<\/p>

As we write our final goodbye through this blog, we want to leave one important thought: AI should not necessarily be something to fear.<\/p>

Throughout this semester, we worked closely with AI, tested its strengths and limitations, and ultimately found that it is, for now, a very bad actor. It can react, but it cannot truly perform with the emotional depth, creativity, and humanity that live theater demands.<\/p>

We encourage future researchers exploring this space to build on our experiments, use our findings, and continue asking difficult questions. There are certainly things we missed, and there is still much more to discover. If you continue this work, we hope you will share your findings with us too.<\/p>

This project also reminded us that AI itself is not inherently creative – it is we humans who shape it, guide it, and give it purpose. It can be a powerful tool to support tasks and systems, but it cannot replace human imagination, emotional intelligence, or creative intention – at least not with current technology.<\/p>

Perhaps this is subjective to our team but AI is not a good actor for all the right reasons. If it were, issues like impersonation, manipulation, and misuse could become far more dangerous.<\/p>

So our final thought is simple: do not fear AI, but do not misuse it either.<\/p>

HONK! HONK!<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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Link to media and material files from the week:<\/h6>