Hotel Reverie

"Hotel Reverie" is the third episode in the seventh series of the British science fiction anthology television series Black Mirror. Written by series creator and showrunner Charlie Brooker and directed by Haolu Wang, it premiered on Netflix on 10 April 2025, with the rest of series seven.

The episode centers around an actress (Issa Rae) who stars in a remake of a 1940s romance film by acting in a simulation alongside AI versions of the characters through an immersive AI-based virtual production. "Hotel Reverie" received critical acclaim, with praise directed towards Rae's performance and the visuals and the more somber and bittersweet tone compared to previous Black Mirror episodes.





== Plot ==



In the present day, A-list actor Brandy Friday is invited by the entertainment technology company called ReDream, who convinces her to star in a high-tech remake of a Keyworth Pictures' classic, emotionally charged romantic film from the 1940s, Hotel Reverie. She only takes the role on the condition that she will play a gender-bending version of Dr. Alex Palmer, the main male love interest.

When Brandy arrives at the studio, she learns that instead of being produced like a traditional film, Brandy's consciousness will instead be transferred into the world of the film itself using an immersive AI-based virtual production technology. In this virtual world, she interacts with digital replicas of the film's original characters, and the story will be filmed and captured live like a play. As the producers running the simulation guide her through the script by speaking to her in real-time, Brandy realizes her character is supposed to play piano, which she is unable to do.