Amazon MGM Studios brings AI to the backlot this March to slash production costs
Amazon MGM Studios begins a closed beta for AI production tools in March. With 30,000 recent layoffs and 350 AI shots already used in 'House of David,' the cost-cutting pivot is real.
Prime Video's House of David infamously used AI in its production.
Key Highlights
- •Amazon MGM Studios begins testing proprietary AI tools with partners next month, aiming for financial results by May.
- •The studio successfully used AI to generate crowd and battle elements for the upcoming House of David series.
- •The move follows 30,000 corporate layoffs, signaling a strategic shift toward high-tech, lower-cost production models.
Amazon has cut roughly 30,000 corporate jobs since October in its largest-ever workforce reduction, yet it is simultaneously aggressively hiring silicon and software talent to automate the most expensive parts of Hollywood. The tech giant’s entertainment division, Amazon MGM Studios, confirmed it will begin a closed beta test for proprietary AI video production tools this coming March, signaling a definitive shift from theoretical experimentation to workflow integration.
This isn't just a research project; it is a rapid-deployment strategy to arrest spiraling production costs.
The "Two-Pizza" AI Studio
The initiative is being led by Albert Cheng, Head of Prime Video & Amazon MGM Studios, who has organized a specialized internal unit dubbed the "AI Studio." Operating under Jeff Bezos’s famous “two pizza team” philosophy, keeping teams small enough to be fed by two pizzas to maximize agility, the group is comprised largely of engineers and scientists rather than traditional creatives.
The timeline is aggressive. The closed beta kicks off in March with select industry partners, and Amazon expects to have actionable data and results to share by May. The goal is to bridge the "last mile" between generic consumer AI models and the precise, consistent control required for cinematic storytelling.
Accelerate, Not Replace?
The move comes at a sensitive time for the entertainment industry, which is still reeling from the dual strikes of 2023 where AI protections were a central bargaining chip. Amazon is attempting to thread the needle between efficiency and labor displacement.
"The cost of creating is so high that it really is hard to make more and it really is hard to take great risk," Cheng told Reuters. "We fundamentally believe that AI can accelerate, but it won't replace, the innovation and the unique aspects that humans bring to create the work."
Despite these assurances, the financial incentives are clear. Amazon is positioning these tools to handle everything from character consistency across shots to "pre-viz" and post-production rendering, tasks that traditionally require hundreds of billable human hours.
The Proof is in the "House of David"
Amazon is already testing these workflows in the wild. For the upcoming second season of the biblical epic House of David, director Jon Erwin utilized a hybrid approach, combining AI generation with live-action footage. The production reportedly used 350 AI-generated shots to expand the scope of battle sequences and crowds without the massive budget typically required for thousands of extras.
The beta will leverage Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Bedrock, integrating multiple Large Language Models (LLMs) to give filmmakers options rather than locking them into a single vendor. However, the overarching message to shareholders is unmistakable: Amazon is building an infrastructure where content scales up, but the headcount does not.
