This rumor ends today.
Photo: Bruce Glikas/WireImage/Getty Images
Scrubs star Zach Braff just gripped his hand tightly around the Streisand-effect lever and heaved it down hard. On Thursday, March 12, Braff went on Instagram Stories to acknowledge a rumor that picked up steam this week thanks to a post by celebrity-gossip account DeuxMoi. Earlier in the day, the Instagram account regurgitated a clip from a December 2025 episode of the podcast I Need You Guys hosted by Max Silvestri, Jenny Slate, and Gabe Liedman in which the comedians discussed a juicy rumor with guest Kumail Nanjiani about an unnamed “well-known actor” Silvestri had been told was “currently in a romantic relationship with his AI chatbot and brings the chatbot with him places.” Silvestri teased that the actor is “as near as A-list as TV can get you” and has a certain level of self-awareness about the whole AI-girlfriend thing. He never revealed the actor, but the clip shows Silvestri texting the suspect’s name to the others, prompting Nanjiani to loudly laugh and call the reveal “perfect, perfect, perfect” and “so good.” Slate then cuts in and says, “We can’t put this on our podcast. It’s not nice.”
The original clip got its fair share of engagement and guesses back in December, and in late February, comedians Chris Fleming and Caleb Hearon also briefly discussed it on Hearon’s podcast, So True. Fleming hinted that the actor in question was “Mr. Tumnus,” a reference to Fleming saying that Braff has “Mr. Tumnus vibes” in his stand-up. (“He’s bringing it to restaurants,” Fleming told Hearon. “People are so humiliating. But this is good for the culture, actually,” Hearon said.) But it wasn’t until the DeuxMoi repost three months later that Braff felt the need to respond to the buildup of claims that he is the AI Chatbot Girlfriend Guy. Overlaid on a screengrab of Silvestri — who, again, never named Braff during the I Need You Guys discussion — from the podcast clip, Braff wrote:
I’m not dating a chatbot.
I can’t believe I have to type these words.
It is a storyline in an upcoming ep of Scrubs.
Maybe it came from that?
Not sure.
But not me.
Love,
The guy not dating his chatbot.
Please update all gossip sites.
Braff followed it with another screengrab of Slate — who, again, just to be clear, never named Braff — with more:
Also I had no idea until tonight (because I’m not on TikTok) that these folks were the origin of this?
He ended his response with one more screengrab featuring Nanjiani — who, yet again, it seems necessary to fully emphasize, never uttered Braff’s name — with some advice:
I feel like now is a good time to be kind to people.
Braff’s response to this whole thing raises a few questions:
• Does Braff realize that his choice to refer to “his chatbot” instead of “a chatbot” in his response implies that he is engaged in some type of relationship with an AI chatbot, whether romantic (which he denies), platonic, or clerical?
• It seems strange for Braff to plaster screengrabs of Silvestri, Slate, and Nanjiani’s faces behind his statement refuting the rumor, because the comedians never claimed it involved Braff to begin with. The podcast is three months old. Why not screenshot the DeuxMoi post featuring the Her movie poster instead?
• What, exactly, is Braff calling unkind? Silvestri said he heard the actor had a certain level of self-awareness about the reactions having an AI-chatbot girlfriend might cause; he described the actor’s general energy as “Yeah, sorry that you’re not onboard with the future.” By using the screenshot of Nanjiani, is Braff calling it mean to laugh at the idea of a TV star who has an AI-chatbot girlfriend?
• Does any of this make Braff appear to be less of a suspect?
• This rumor barely got any coverage when the I Need You Guys podcast was released in December. Does Braff recognize that now, since his Instagram Story posts, “Zach Braff Says He Doesn’t Have an AI Chatbot Girlfriend” headlines are all over the internet?
• Is this good promo for the new Scrubs?
Maybe everyone involved just needs to step back and get some perspective by looking to Silvestri, who posted on Instagram Stories on March 13 after Braff’s posts made everything explode. “Have never mentioned this man’s name in my life,” Silvestri wrote. “Aren’t there more important stories in the world right now? Between tariffs and energy prices, the average American can barely afford to charge their girlfriend.”
