AI is a time-honored movie trope. Now it can write its own script.

LOS ANGELES — In Hollywood, the first weeks of every year are dedicated to parallel and overlapping rituals, including Golden Globes prep, pre-Oscar nomination parties and packing up for the Sundance Film Festival. This year, though, the usual awards season chatter was spiked with more anxiety than usual.

On Jan. 12, the day before the part-glitzy, part-gemütlich AFI Awards luncheon, the Hollywood Reporter (THR) published a story about ChatGPT, the artificial intelligence program that for months had been captivating — and kind of scaring — American culture with its ability to spit out surprisingly convincing essays, poems and news articles based on a few prompts.