Conrad Ricamora Hopes His New Role Will Make You Rethink Your Relationship To AI

LOADINGERROR LOADINGA year after his run in Broadway’s “Oh, Mary!” came to a close, Conrad Ricamora is back onstage in a thriller he hopes will encourage viewers to reduce — or, at least, reevaluate — their reliance on screens.The “How to Get Away with Murder” actor currently stars in Andrew Stein’s play “Disruption,” now making its New York debut at Pershing Square Signature Center through October after a 2023 run in London.He portrays Ben, a married Columbia University professor who agrees to become a beta-tester for an artificial intelligence algorithm designed to guide users through having children, buying a home and other life milestones in pursuit of what makes them “truly happy.” Advertisement Directed by Hersh Ellis, “Disruption” is one of several new plays to explore the evolving impact of AI on everyday life.Shaunette Renée Wilson, left, and Conrad Ricamora star in the off-Broadway play “Disruption,” now playing in New York through October.

Emilio MadridAs to why he believes AI is such a rich subject for dramatization, Ricamora told HuffPost, “It has the potential to change the course of humanity in a way that no other technology has.It can act on its own and make its own decisions regardless of what we tell it to do, which is terrifying.”Advertisement The algorithm in “Disruption” is being developed by Ben’s Silicon Valley entrepreneur pal, Nick (John David Washington), and his Gen Z business partner, Raven (Emma Kikue).

Together, the pair quietly observed the online habits of Ben and his psychoanalyst wife, Suzie (Shaunette Renée Wilson), along with two other mutual friends and their spouses, to analyze their desires.What Ben and his cohorts don’t know, however, is that the technology has also uncovered their vulnerabilities, from financial woes and infidelity to suppressed questions about their sexuality.If those secrets are revealed, they could have a disastrous impact on each parti...