We won’t get fooled again

Recently, I posted a picture of Grace Kelly and Audrey Hepburn together. In it, they are sitting side by side in director’s chairs, joyful, clearly enjoying each other’s company. I was surprised to have found it, since in the past, I’d scoured the internet for photos of these two icons together, the bookends to my Hollywood old glam obsession, and I’d never found one. The only photograph that I’d ever found of these two icons together was this “backstage at the Oscars” pic.

I’ve written books inspired by Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor, and Audrey Hepburn and I’ve been obsessed with these stars my entire life. I love seeing pics of these lovelies together. Grace Kelly and Elizabeth Taylor were friends— there are tons of pics of them together, each one more delicious than the last. (Did someone say conga line at Elizabeth’s 40th birthday party?!) At the end of THE LIZ TAYLOR RING and THE AUDREY HEPBURN ESTATE, I have a section where I detail all of the Easter eggs that I included in the book, pages and pages worth. The product of years of research.

So, why hadn’t I found this photo of Grace and Audrey sitting side by side ever before?

I couldn’t figure out why, but I didn’t care. I quickly posted the photo to my Instagram page, with the caption: Icons.

After I posted the pic, Grace Influential, the platform created by the Princess Grace Foundation who generously championed my novel, THE GRACE KELLY DRESS, reached out and told me why I’d never seen this image before. It’s because the image was created by AI.

I immediately took the photo down, but the damage was done. The photo had already gotten thousands of views, generated tons of comments. How could I have so easily fallen into this trap? Why did I so easily doubt myself, my years of research, and assume that I’d missed something? I’m a former lawyer. I’m good at research! So, why was I so willing to doubt my own eyes? My own memory?

There’s something about these AI generated images and posts. They seem real. And in this distracted attention-deficit economy, it’s easy to take something at face value and move on.

It’s left me shaken. If I was so easily fooled about something that I knew in my gut I'd researched, then what else can I be fooled about? Of course, this only happened because I posted the photo so quickly and didn’t take the time to think about it. I got excited about a topic that I love, and I never want to lose that joy. I still want to be the sort of person who gets gleeful about the things I love.

So, I’m not going to be too hard on myself— I was duped, but it won’t happen again.

(At least I don’t think it will.)

Besos, Bisous, Baci,
Brenda