Twitch continues to be an enticing place for celebrities that want more interaction with their fans. We’ve seen folks like T-Pain, Mike Shinoda, Snoop Dogg, and more on the platform. Now, the multi-talented actress and musician Keke Palmer, who starred in Jordan Peele’s critically acclaimed film Nope, is the latest celebrity to hop on the streaming train.
If there’s one thing Palmer knows how to do, it’s stay busy in her creative life. While only 29 years old, she’s been a working Hollywood actress for almost two decades. She first appeared in 2004’s Barbershop 2: Back in Business and followed it up two years later with a starring role as Akeelah in Akeelah And The Bee.
Since then, she’s done everything from long-running television shows, Broadway productions, and music albums, most recently starting her digital platform for Black content creators looking to showcase their work, KeyTV.
After announcing her pregnancy in late 2022 on Saturday Night Live, Palmer began filling her time off from acting by catching up on playing video games, especially Sims 4. On her Twitch bio, she talks about this briefly, “i got on here because i got preggers and started spending more time at home which got me back into playing the sims. my followers wanted to see my game play and now we hereeee.”
Before starting her Twitch channel, she’d dabbled in live streaming her gaming exploits on Instagram. On her IG, Palmer began going live and narrating the ridiculous antics her Sims got into on her most recent play sessions. Palmer has a keen eye for creating viral moments on social media, something that translates well to what she hopes to help other Black creators do with KeyTV.
Quickly, clips from her streams went viral on Twitter and other social media platforms, showcasing the funny hijinks she got into with her characters. After a large push from her fans, Palmer set up a Twitch channel in February of 2023 and began streaming.
On Palmer’s Twitch channel, simply called “Keke,” she streams everything from video games she plays (mainly Sims but other titles like Tekken and Detroit: Become Human), karaoke, cooking, and general hangouts to catch up with her audience. She writes more about this in her bio, “i like role playing obvi, i like fighting games, i like decision based games too.. but im into many things outside of gaming because i get bored v easily haha. i like trying new things, diy stuff, karaoke, stand up(light weight haha), reviewing reality tv, reviewing movies, documentaries, conspiracies!”
Palmer’s streams are lowkey and fairly irregular given her busy schedule, but when she does go live, you can expect a no-holds-barred look into who she is as a person when she’s not on the silver screen. On one of her most recent broadcasts, she streamed the narrative, choose your own adventure game Detroit: Become Human which centers around the various lives of androids who are becoming sentient in a future Detroit.
https://m.twitch.tv/videos/1789587125
The infectious charm and wit she brings to her characters on screen are given a different light on stream. In her Detroit: Become Human live stream, chaos quickly ensued as Palmer and her partner, Darius Jackson, ate takeout while trying to figure out how to play the game which features complex button inputs.
What’s interesting about Palmer’s streams is how her immense knowledge of acting and direction comes through in how she engages with the games she plays. As if on cue, Palmer and Jackson fall into character while playing Detroit, giving their own voice acting to the cinematic scenes. A particularly hilarious moment occurs as Palmer controls her android character, dodging an assailant while she gets more and more on edge trying to keep up with the button prompts.
This is shown even more when she plays the Sims 4. Palmer creates in-depth storylines for all of the characters she creates that highlight insanely funny situations you’d expect in an evening sitcom. “This is the storyline,” she says to the viewers before telling a detailed backstory about the messy relationships her characters have. Upon giving the setup for the predicament her characters are in, she proceeds to voice all of them in their respective voices to an absurdly funny extent.
It’s rare that audiences get such an intimate look into the life and persona of their favorite celebrities. While we are certainly living in the age of over-stimulation and social media fatigue, watching Palmer on stream is a much different experience than seeing a clip of a post on a social media platform. Palmer’s Twitch streams further confirm what her on-screen performances already suggest — she is one of the world’s best at blending humor with drama today, no matter the medium.
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