# Opinion: Tom Holloway's new play Eliza dramatizes the origins of AI at MTC

Digest AI · Society & Work · published 2026-10-03T01:57:39Z

Canonical: https://digestai.news/story/opinion-tom-holloway-s-new-play-eliza-dramatizes-the-origins-of-ai-at

## Summary

Playwright Tom Holloway's stage production Eliza has premiered at the Melbourne Theatre Company, exploring computer scientist Joseph Weizenbaum's 1966 creation of the early natural language program at MIT. Directed by Paige Rattray, the drama stars Dan Spielman as Weizenbaum, alongside Hamish Michael and Manali Datar as his colleagues.

The narrative tracks Weizenbaum's attempt to disprove Alan Turing's theories on machine intelligence by building a program that simulates a psychotherapist. Instead of proving machines cannot think, Weizenbaum is horrified when his peers treat the software as genuinely empathetic. According to the review, the production incorporates surrealist psychological horror inspired by Kafka's The Trial to highlight human susceptibility to believing artificial systems possess understanding.

## Key points

- Tom Holloway's play Eliza premiered at Melbourne Theatre Company, directed by Paige Rattray.
- The production portrays Joseph Weizenbaum's 1966 creation of the Eliza chatbot at MIT.
- The narrative examines how users quickly attributed real human empathy to a simple psychotherapist script.

## Why it matters

The play dramatizes the Eliza effect, an early example of anthropomorphism that remains a central concern in modern generative AI and human-machine interaction.

## Sources

1. [Eliza review – an ambitious, unsettling play about the birth of AI](https://theguardian.com/stage/2026/oct/03/eliza-review-melbourne-theatre-company-birth-of-ai) (The Guardian AI, 2026-10-03)

## Cite

Digest AI, "Opinion: Tom Holloway's new play Eliza dramatizes the origins of AI at MTC", 3 October 2026, https://digestai.news/story/opinion-tom-holloway-s-new-play-eliza-dramatizes-the-origins-of-ai-at

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