{"id":379805,"date":"2026-03-11T16:58:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:58:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/379805\/"},"modified":"2026-03-11T16:58:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-11T16:58:07","slug":"rebecca-gayheart-on-eric-dance-and-the-ai-voice-restoration-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/379805\/","title":{"rendered":"Rebecca Gayheart on Eric Dance and the AI Voice Restoration Project"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n\tEric Dane<\/a> \u201cjust had this way of speaking,\u201d his wife Rebecca Gayheart Dane<\/a> remembers.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe widow of the \u201cGrey\u2019s Anatomy\u201d and \u201cEuphoria\u201d star is speaking out for the first time since Eric Dane\u2019s death on Feb. 19<\/a>, in support of a charitable \u00a0initiative that was deeply important to the actor. Dane died at the age of 53 of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, or ALS.<\/p>\n

\n\tIn the final weeks of his life, Dane took part in a voice restoration project championed by AI firm ElevenLabs. <\/a>It was a means of restoring his ability to communicate \u2014 via a synthetic voice created using past recordings from Dane\u2019s voice \u2013 as well as an effort to leave an important part of himself behind for his daughters, Billie, 16, and Georgia, 14.<\/p>\n

\n\tDane \u201cwas really excited about it, because he was losing his voice, and it was becoming more difficult for him to communicate each and every day. So it became sort of urgent,\u201d Gayheart Dane tells Variety.<\/p>\n

\n\tWeeks before he died, Dane was able to hear how ElevenLabs<\/a> recreated his voice with precision from an array of past recordings that the actor provided. ElevenLabs<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cHe was waiting anxiously to hear it, and when we got it from ElevenLabs it was a really big moment. It was a powerful moment. We played it, and Eric became visibly emotional,\u201d Gayheart Dane says. \u201cAnd when I heard it, I cried. I think everyone in the room did.\u201d<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\t\t\"\"<\/p>\n

\t\t\t\t\tAI firm Eleven Labs has produced 11 docu shorts depicting the use of its Voice<\/p>\n

\n\tElevenLabs has pledged to provide a lifetime software license and support services for free to those who suffer from terminal neurological diseases such as ALS, which gradually strip away a person\u2019s ability to speak. The company, primarily based in New York and London, specializes in audio technology and offers a vast database of licensed and copyright-compliant voices that uses can access as an AI platform. ElevenLabs has pledged to help 1 million people with services that amount to $1 billion.<\/p>\n

\n\tTo help spread the word, the company has produced a series of 11 docu-shorts, \u201c11 Voices,\u201d profiling a handful of the more than 7,000 people who have been helped by its technology and the voice restoration initiative. Dane had been scheduled to be part of a bonus episode for the series, but then his health began to deteriorate, which made filming impossible. \u201c11 Voices\u201d is set to debut March 13 at the SXSW festival in Austin, Texas. Gayheart Dane will take part in a panel session tied to the premiere that was to have featured Dane.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cHe wanted to advocate for love and for the movement [around ALS] and so I\u2019m there to do this for him,\u201d she says. \u201cFor a million people to get a voice to be able to communicate with their children or their loved ones or their caretakers or their doctors or in their job \u2014 this is a really huge movement.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tGayheart Dane says her family is \u201cstill in a state of shock\u201d at Dane\u2019s passing after being diagnosed with ALS in 2024. The adversity that her family faced head-on brought out the best in many people around them, she says.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI just want to thank everybody for being so kind to us during the last couple of years. It\u2019s been challenging and meaningful, and people are kind,\u201d Gayheart Dane says.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI\u2019m having trouble receiving all of the support and love coming at me from every which way because of Eric and the [entertainment] community that\u2019s so generous with their time. They\u2019ve been holding me and the girls up the last two weeks, and I don\u2019t think they\u2019re going anywhere. I think they\u2019re in it for the long haul. Hollywood gets a bad rap. That kind of makes me mad, because we have a lovely community of people, and I\u2019m so grateful for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tElevenLabs\u2019 AI system is fine-tuned to absorb every syllable and nuance of a person\u2019s natural speaking voice from pre-existing recordings. The ability to provide something that is close to the real thing will be groundbreaking for families touched by ALS, Cerebral Palsy, Motor Neuron disease and other debilitating illnesses.<\/p>\n

\n\tMati Staniszewski, cofounder of New York-based ElevenLabs, says the voice restoration project is an example of using AI tools to enhance one of the characteristics that makes us unique as humans.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cJust being able to help people bring a little bit of their identity back, bring that incredible element of what makes us human, and see that both for the individual and also for people around them \u2013 that is incredibly motivating for us of what the technology can do for the world,\u201d says Staniszewski. \u201cI think there\u2019s nothing better than seeing the impact of technology for good and seeing the happiness of people that use it. We\u2019d love to give it to as many people as need it.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tA few days after Dane got his ElevenLabs voice system, Dane and Gayheart Dane played it for their daughters.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cThey were like, that\u2019s not a recording. That\u2019s your voice. That\u2019s you. So it was spot on. He just had this way of speaking, and they captured it so beautifully,\u201d Gayheart Dane says.<\/p>\n

\n\tThe couple\u2019s teenage daughters, \u201csigned off on it, and we were thrilled to have it because we knew what was coming down the pike,\u201d Gayheart Dane says. \u201cWe were all really struggling with the voice loss that he was already experiencing. Knowing we had that in our back pocket, just felt really good. I\u2019m sad, and I know Eric is too, that we didn\u2019t ever get to really use it. But what I do know is that he would want as many people as possible to have access\u201d to voice restoration technology.<\/p>\n

\n\tFor Dane, given his legacy as an actor, the voice archive is particularly meaningful.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cYour voice is such a big part of your craft and you\u2019re a storyteller. He really understood how meaningful having the voice was. As his speech started to decrease, his ability to speak went away. He did lose a certain part of himself. He wasn\u2019t able to express things in his own very special way. So he really understood how meaningful it was and the extraordinary honor giving someone back their voice and what that would feel like for others, and he wanted to make sure that he did everything he could do to make that happen,\u201d Gayheart Dane says. \u201c11 Voices is a great movement, and I know he\u2019s happy that this is getting done. He could not be happier that a million people will get their voices back \u2014 that I know.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n\tElevenLabs has made its mark over the past few years with its technology and by its focus on engaging in high-profile licensing deals with actors, family estates and by negotiating a groundbreaking AI agreement with SAG-AFTRA. The company has made an conscious effort to be seen as respectful of creative rights and copyright concerns amid the grave fears that AI will be a Hollywood jobs killer.<\/p>\n

\n\t\u201cI\u2019ve been learning more about ElevenLabs, and all the ways that they use someone\u2019s voice, and all the ways of a patient who\u2019s experienced voice loss can use the restored voice that they give them. It\u2019s really incredible, because it\u2019s just so realistic,\u201d Gayheart Dane says. \u201cWhat we don\u2019t remember is that our voice is such a big part of who we are.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Eric Dane \u201cjust had this way of speaking,\u201d his wife Rebecca Gayheart Dane remembers. The widow of the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":379806,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[261],"tags":[291,289,290,18,114747,77485,19,17,174553,82],"class_list":["post-379805","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-artificial-intelligence","tag-ai","tag-artificial-intelligence","tag-artificialintelligence","tag-eire","tag-elevenlabs","tag-eric-dane","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-rebecca-gayheart-dane","tag-technology"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/116211607692840407","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379805","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=379805"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/379805\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/379806"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=379805"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=379805"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=379805"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}