I love an account on X (formerly Twitter) called @LizaMinnelliOutlives (which is not run by the icon herself, shockingly) that lists things like celebrity deaths or deals. Well, in a twist, the real Liza Minnelli is no longer outliving her late mother Judy Garland’s new words. The actress and singer has given ElevenLabs, an AI startup that offers cloning services, permission to recreate her mother’s voice for its new Reader app. Garland joins James Dean, Burt Reynolds and Sir Laurence Olivier among the deceased stars whose AI voices are featured in the “iconic voices collection,” thanks to settlements with their estates for undisclosed sums.
The voices will exist only on the Reader app, and people will be able to use them for things like narrating an e-book. “It’s exciting to see our mother’s voice accessible to the millions who love her,” said Minnelli, the Garland estate representative. “With the spectacular new technology offered by ElevenLabs, our family believes this will bring new fans to Mama and be exciting for those who already cherish the unparalleled legacy Mama has given and continues to give to the world.” An excerpt from Garland’s reading The Wizard of Oz appears in ElevenLab’s promotional video on YouTube — personally, I find it a little odd, but I can see the appeal.
ElevenLabs launched its Reader app in late June to let users listen to any text on their phone, including messages, PDFs, and news articles. It’s currently only available in English for iOS users in the US, UK, and Canada. However, ElevenLabs has a waitlist for Android users and says it will launch on the Google Play Store in the “coming weeks.” The company also says it’s working on making the app available in all the languages supported by its multilingual model (29 so far) and will then launch it globally.
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