Greta Thunberg turns into ‘viral dance sensation’ in Channel 4 deepfake

Video released to celebrate Earth Day

To mark Earth Day, Channel 4 has released a deepfake video of Greta Thunberg teaching fans the “Man Like Greta” TikTok dance.

The deepfake is performed by impressionist Katia Kvinge and written by Stu Richards and Alasdair Beckett-King, and it shows the Swedish environmental activist dancing to an original hip-hop song about climate change. The video also includes a “how-to” tutorial.

“Hi I’m Greta Thunberg, viral dance sensation,” says Kvinge in the clip.

She describes her dance as a “Macarena for the apocalypse”.

Channel 4 said: “Whilst humorous in approach, this captivating content aims to deliver an urgent and important message about the impact of climate change in the lead up to Earth Day, as well as looking to increase our audiences’ awareness of deepfake technology and how it can be used.”

Kvinge added: “We all know Greta is a brilliant activist but she’s also shown a great sense of humour in how she’s dealt with various politicians and obstacles in her own witty, dry way and it was my pleasure to play her.”

Deepfakes use a form of artificial intelligence called deep learning to make moving images of fake events. They are a synthetic media in which a person in an existing image or video is replaced with someone else’s likeness, making people appear to have said or done something they have not.

In February, deepfake videos of Tom Cruise golfing, performing magic tricks and telling jokes about Mikhail Gorbachev went viral on TikTok.