Charismatic actress Keke Palmer is taking her comedic talents from her viral Instagram videos over to Amazon for the ideal media partnership.
Variety reports that Palmer is diving into the world of fiction with her Instagram characters and sketch comedy videos to create a collection of short stories to be published by Amazon Original Stories in the fall of this year. She will also play each role in the Audible audiobook.
“What started out as an Instagram sketch, led me to one of my most beloved characters, Lady Miss Jacqueline. She’s always been larger than life—and a huge symbol of the moment when I realized I wanted to create worlds for my audience to get lost in. In effect, she was the beginning of my producing journey. The opportunity to share what makes her not only funny but important, is exciting!” Palmer shared in a statement. “The team at Amazon Original Stories and I have a shared vision and what they have already been able to accomplish pushes me to bring my best and then some. I can’t wait to together share a new side of Lady Miss, her truth, and comedy with the world!”
A press release shares that Palmer first came up with the idea behind her viral videos just over five years ago, when she began experimenting with new types of comedy in the digital space.
The characters she created on her Instagram account — brought to life by her signature comedic quirks — have since tackled issues such as class, race, femininity, and culture. Now that she’s teamed up with the Amazon team, she’s elevating her platform to make her short stories a mainstay.
“We are thrilled to team up with Keke to help expand her unique vision and unforgettable cast of characters into a broader literary universe,” Amazon Original Stories publisher Julia Sommerfeld said in a statement. “We like to think of Amazon Original Stories as serving as a playground for an innovator like Keke, to bring her groundbreaking characters to life in new ways and to push the boundaries of storytelling.”
Though Palmer had no prior plans to get into fictional work, she’s excited to embark on this new journey and breathe new life into her comedic storytelling skills.
“I’m just really excited for everyone to see it and jump into these stories. And really, I’m just excited for them to see it come off the page, and see the kind of world that I decided to create with these characters and the types of themes,” she told Variety.
She adds, “I think there are a lot of important themes that are going to be very relatable to the growing person in this millennium, and so I’m excited to see how they feel it’s expressed.”
