“SNL UK” put a royal spin on artificial intelligence by bringing Princess Diana back for a pointed sketch involving King Charles III. The cold open featured Jack Shep as Diana opposite Larry Dean as the king, using the unlikely reunion to poke fun at Charles’ recent brush with the tech world.
The comedy also didn’t shy away from jokes about Earl Spencer‘s explosive memoir claim that the King once said Diana would soon be forgotten after her death.
“SNL UK” turned Princess Diana into King Charles’ personal AI assistant for its latest cold open, with Jack Shep reprising his impression of the late royal.
The sketch opened with Larry Dean’s Charles meeting two tech executives following the real King’s recent AI summit in Scotland. They unveiled their creation, the “Deeply Intelligent Autonomous Neurokinetic Android,” conveniently shortened to Diana.
Shep then emerged as the AI in Diana’s famous revenge dress, offering to draft a business plan or find a petrol station. Charles initially failed to recognize her before eventually declaring, “It’s that woman from the ’90s!”
The Sketch Show Poked Fun At King Charles’ Latest Diana Drama
The sketch also targeted the controversy surrounding Charles Spencer’s new memoir and his claims about Charles after Diana’s death. Her brother alleged that Charles said the Princess of Wales would soon be forgotten following her death in 1997.
Buckingham Palace has denied the claim, but “SNL UK” wasted little time turning the dispute into material. After Larry Dean’s Charles finally recognized the AI version of his late ex-wife, he quipped, “Well, as I allegedly said, she was soon forgotten.”
When the Diana android refused an order to shut down, the tech executives realized they had lost control of their creation. Dean’s Charles responded with another pointed punchline: “This was the problem last time!”
King Charles Issues A Stark Warning To AI Leaders
Earlier last week, the King struck a much more serious tone while meeting some of the biggest names in artificial intelligence.
The monarch hosted tech executives and government officials at Dumfries House in Ayrshire, Scotland, on Thursday. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis and OpenAI CFO Sarah Friar were among those attending, alongside Britain’s AI minister Kanishka Narayan.
Charles told the group that both the substance and pace of AI development were “intriguing and deeply concerning in equal measure.” He was particularly concerned that increasingly powerful technology could fall into the wrong hands.
The King warned that such systems could potentially be used with catastrophic consequences: “Surely, then, we need sufficient means of control before it is all too late?”
AI’s Growing Role In Its Own Development Raises New Questions
Charles’ concerns echo a broader debate over just how quickly artificial intelligence is advancing and how much control humans will retain over its development.
Chris Mattmann, UCLA’s chief data and artificial intelligence officer, recently pointed to Anthropic’s Claude as an example of how quickly that relationship is changing.
Anthropic disclosed in May that Claude was writing roughly 80% of the code used to build itself. In this dispensation, rather than humans alone designing each new generation of AI, increasingly capable models can now contribute to the work behind their successors.
King Charles Wants AI To Remain In Humanity’s Service
For King Charles, managing artificial intelligence is about more than keeping increasingly powerful systems under control. During his meeting with AI leaders in Scotland, the monarch challenged the industry to consider the principles guiding the technology as its capabilities expand.
Charles argued that those developing AI have a responsibility beyond simply pushing innovation forward. He urged them to ensure the technology remains in service of humanity, communities and the natural world. The King also emphasized international cooperation, suggesting that managing a technology with global reach will require countries and companies to work together.
