Keke Palmer's Incredible Journey To Hollywood

Keke Palmer can do it all. The multi-hyphenate star of "Nope" has conquered so many aspects of the entertainment industry that it's sometimes hard to keep them all straight; she's an actor, a singer, a talk show host, an author, and a business mogul, among many other roles we're probably forgetting. How does she do it all? Well, according to an interview with Andscape, she sets her ego aside and takes any project that meets some pretty simple criteria. "I'm like, are the people cool? Is the material good? Are they going to have lunch?" she asks herself. If so... "Let's go!"

It feels like the one-woman meme machine has been around forever, so looking back on her long and varied career can seem like a daunting task. Never fear; we've put Palmer's career highs on a timeline for you. Emphasis on "just the highs;" the woman's done so much that there's a lot more we couldn't fit here! Remember that time she hosted a show on Quibi? (Come to think of it... do you even remember Quibi?) Read on to track Keke Palmer's incredible journey to Hollywood. Say it with us, now... Baby, this is Keke Palmer. 

Keke Palmer started acting when she was very young; in 2004, she had a small role as Gina's niece in "Barbershop 2: Back in Business," still credited as Lauren 'Keke' Palmer. Two years later, however, "Keke Palmer" the superstar burst onto the scene as the lead in the critically acclaimed film "Akeelah and the Bee." In the movie, Palmer starred opposite acting legends like Angela Bassett and Laurence Fishburne, playing a young speller from the south side of Los Angeles who goes all the way to the National Spelling Bee. She famously spells the word "prestidigitation," and Palmer herself never forgot how it goes. In a 2022 TikTok with Laron Hines, she proudly spelled the word and announced, "I never forget my lines!"

Back in 2006, a 12-year-old Palmer told NPR that she took the role in part because she was excited by the challenge of playing someone so unlike herself. Unlike the shy Akeelah, Palmer said, "I'm not afraid to be myself ... me, myself, I didn't struggle with anything like that." Palmer would continue to "be herself" throughout her career, to the delight of fans everywhere; in other words, the role spelled great things for Palmer's future. Looking back years later for IMDb, she reflected, "It shaped the trajectory and path of my life."

After "True Jackson, VP" ended, Keke Palmer returned to her movie-star roots in a 2012 film called "Joyful Noise." As in much of her career, Palmer got the chance to work opposite acting royalty — this time, she held her own in a leading role alongside Dolly Parton, Queen Latifah, and Kris Kristofferson. Palmer played Latifah's daughter Olivia in the movie, and her character was one of the standout members of a gospel choir gearing up to compete at a national level.

Palmer had nothing but glowing things to say about her co-stars; the film marked her second role alongside Latifah, with whom she starred in "Barbershop 2: Back in Business." She especially spoke highly of working with Parton. "I just expected her to be a little bit guarded, but she wasn't at all," she gushed to HuffPost. "She's like a mother. She made fudge bars for everyone on set."

The film also required Palmer to sing, including a cover of Michael Jackson's "Man in the Mirror." In an interview with The San Antonio Current, Palmer said she was somewhat intimidated by the big shoes she had to fill. "I was really happy and excited and nervous about it because it is a Michael Jackson song," she said. "No one can do Michael like Michael can." However, she added that she was happy with the way the cover turned out. She should be; it reached #7 on Billboard's Christian Digital Song Sales chart.

In 2014, Keke Palmer added another honor to her already-impressive list of credits: starring on Broadway. Palmer became the first Black actor to take on the role of Cinderella in Disney's smash-hit musical of the same name, stepping into the glass slippers made famous on television by another Black icon: Brandy. "I feel like the reason I'm able to do this is definitely because Brandy did it on TV," she told the Associated Press (via HuffPost). "In me doing this, it shows everybody that everything is possible." Vanity Fair noted that this may seem daunting for many young stars, but not Palmer; she was nothing but excited. She told the magazine, "Thinking about that [audience] gives me energy. Seeing that many people in the audience, who you can't recognize, that's what excites you and gets you pumped."

Though she recognized the significance of taking on the part as the first Black woman to do so, she told Essence that she disliked that this fact was even noteworthy. "I hate saying it was a huge deal that I was the first African-American to ever be a part of this musical. It's great, but I also want people to feel like it's crazy, because it shouldn't always be this way." However, she added, "I loved that my little brother and sister got to watch this show and actually see a diverse world just like the one around them."

Keke Palmer has given the world so much, including the catchphrase she injected into the culture in 2016: "the gag is..." In a much-discussed appearance on "Late Night with Seth Meyers," Palmer explained her snapchat popularity to the politely confused host, clarifying her frequent use of the phrase "the gag." She told the audience, "Whenever you're crazy, just put 'the gag' in there, and it's all fine." Sensing that Meyers had no idea what she was talking about, she added, "It's the catch. It's the coup, it's the catch, it's ... the one thing." An example included, "I sent my ex-boyfriend a hundred text messages and he didn't reply ... but the gag is, he still loves me!"

The meme spawned think pieces galore; after Vulture called it "a fun new saying," MTV clarified that the phrase actually has deep roots in Black gay culture. Should straight, white people be saying it? What about merely posting an image of Palmer's face while she delivered her catchphrase, signaling "the gag is..." to those in the know?

If you'll excuse us... the gag is, Palmer didn't seem to care about the larger conversation around the phrase she had adopted as her own. Instead, ever the businesswoman, Palmer turned it into a mockumentary the following year. "That's The Gag" was an eight-episode scripted webseries built around the meme; its official description said the show "is (very) loosely based off of Palmer's real life experiences in this zany industry called showbiz."

While promoting her role in "Hustlers," Keke Palmer accidentally went mega-viral. Her press tour took her to the Vanity Fair offices, where she participated in their "Lie Detector Test" series. Wearing a cream-colored blazer, her hair slicked back and two hoops dangling from her ears, the magazine hooked the star up to a lie detector. They asked her a series of questions that ranged from factual to deeply personal.

Palmer ran into trouble, however, when the proctor slid a photograph across the table. "Would you say that True Jackson, VP was a better VP ... than Dick Cheney?" he asked her. Palmer looked shocked, muttering, "Who the hell is...?" And then: she said the words that would go down in internet infamy. "I hate to say it. I hope I don't sound ridiculous ... I don't know who this man is," she began. "I mean, he could be walking down the street, I wouldn't ... I wouldn't know a thing. Sorry to this man."

The Internet couldn't get enough. "Sorry to this man" became a meme, a pithy way to dismiss someone not worth your time ... as Cheney was, plainly, not worth Palmer's. In 2022, Palmer revisited the moment with Vanity Fair, and she confessed that she still didn't know the man. "I didn't even honestly do the research," she said. "I left him where he was at."

In addition to being a television star, a movie actor, a standout on stage, and a reliable event host, there's another aspect of Keke Palmer's career worth mentioning: she's a popstar, too! Her highest-charting solo single, "It's My Turn Now," was released all the way back in 2007; however, in addition to numerous well-received soundtrack singles and collaborations with artists like Jason Derulo, Palmer has continued to pump out fun, danceable R&B jams on her own. In other words, her music has matured and transformed as she has; she even launched her own label, Big Boss Entertainment. "It's about empowering myself," she told Billboard, because, "I always felt exploited."

Her most mature effort to date was released in 2020, a project called "Virgo Tendencies" made up of two separate EPs. The first EP, especially, received positive reviews from critics including This Is RnB. She looks stunning on the purple-hued cover, showing off a more sultry side to the singer than most fans were familiar with. In an interview with Pride.com, Palmer explained that the music echoed the space she found herself in while quarantining due to the COVID-19 pandemic. "Both of these projects came out of me really having the time to focus solely on the music and put my thoughts into what I wanted to say," she reflected. "I'm really proud of how it came about because I feel like there's music on there, but there's also this overall thread of humor." 

Jordan Peele's "Nope" was released in the summer of 2022, and while the sci-fi horror film's plot was shrouded in secrecy ahead of its debut, whoever was in charge of the film's publicity must have realized they had a secret weapon: Keke Palmer. After starring in "Lightyear," the Summer of Keke continued thanks to her dynamite performance on the "Nope" press tour. Palmer kept her fans laughing, from a crackerjack, instantly-viral impression of her "Akeelah and the Bee" co-star Angela Bassett, to a meme-worthy moment where she failed to recognize "The X-Files" leads Mulder and Scully.

In "Nope," Palmer plays Emerald Haywood, co-owner of a ranch that rents horses to Hollywood productions. She and her brother OJ (Daniel Kaluuya) stumble on a shocking discovery in the sky, and the film spirals out of control from there. The character is queer, and Palmer told The Washington Post that she liked playing into that aspect of the role. "I really love having a character that redefines what people think about women," she said. "[Masculinity and femininity] played into my balance of what strength looked like for Emerald, because she's not just strong. She's soft. I think that's also important as a Black woman; I don't want to be one-note." You can call Keke Palmer a lot of things, but "one-note" sure isn't one of them.

Not since Cardi B's 2018 pregnancy reveal has there been a more epic debut appearance on "Saturday Night Live." During her previously mentioned December 2022 hosting gig, Keke Palmer debuted her own growing baby bump, confirming fans' months-long suspicions that she was expecting a baby with boyfriend Darius Jackson. "There's some rumors going around. People have been in my comments saying, 'Keke's having a baby, Keke's pregnant,' and I want to set the record straight — I am," the multi-hyphenate star revealed during her monologue. Palmer, who was previously diagnosed with PCOS, went on to share her excitement, adding, "This has been the biggest blessing, and I am so excited, guys, I'm gonna be a mom!"

In a post-"SNL" appreciation post, Palmer gushed over her unborn baby, "This year has taken me for a ride! And how cool, my baby and I are already doing it all together," the "Akeelah and the Bee" star wrote in part on Instagram, before thanking family and friends for their support. "And thank you to my other half @dvulton for giving me the things that only true unity can bring."

Palmer and Jackson started dating in 2021 after being introduced by his younger brother — and if her words are anything to go by, Palmer simply couldn't ask for more. "This is the happiest I've ever felt with someone," she told Bustle in March 2022.