Amazon drops Altman biopic days after $50B OpenAI infrastructure deal

Amazon MGM Studios has abandoned Artificial, a nearly complete feature film dramatizing Sam Altman's November 2023 removal from OpenAI's board, days after AWS announced a $50 billion infrastructure deal with the company.

The film stars Andrew Garfield as Altman and Russian actor Yura Borisov as Ilya Sutskever, the chief scientist who led the brief board coup. Amazon had partnered on production but delayed release multiple times before terminating the distribution agreement on June 19, 2026. The studio offered no substantive explanation, saying only that the project "would be better suited to another distributor."

The timing raises questions about the connection. AWS disclosed the $50 billion commitment to OpenAI data-center capacity on June 16—three days before the cancellation. The deal positions AWS as OpenAI's primary cloud provider through 2030 and includes joint hardware development for large-scale training runs. A high-profile dramatization of boardroom turmoil at a newly minted strategic partner creates awkward optics for both parties, though Amazon has not acknowledged any link between the two events.

Artificial completed principal photography and was in post-production. Producers are now shopping the film to other studios.