Keke Palmer Said Filming ‘Nope’ Gave Her ‘a Lot of Anxiety’
The release of Jordan Peele’s highly anticipated horror flick Nope is just around the corner. And Nope star Keke Palmer has admitted that filming the movie gave her “a lot of anxiety” — but not for the reasons fans might think.
What is ‘Nope’ about? Keke Palmer’s role, story details, and other cast members
Peele, who made his directorial debut with 2017’s Get Out, announced his third feature film back in November 2020. Starring Palmer alongside Oscar winner Daniel Kaluuya and The Walking Dead alum Steven Yeun, Nope follows the residents of a “lonely gulch in inland California” as they bear witness to an “uncanny and chilling discovery,” per IMDb. The film is set to arrive in theaters on July 22.
Palmer and Kaluuya play Emerald and OJ Haywood, two siblings living and working on their family’s ranch. Yeun plays the spiffy cowboy huckster Ricky “Jupe” Park.
The trailer shows these characters saying “nope” to a mysterious alien ship in the sky that seems to possess the ability to kill earthlings who look at it. OJ and Emerald resolve to profit off of the UFO and capture footage of it. But unsurprisingly, the supernatural entities on the ship don’t exactly want to be seen.
The teaser also shows Jupe making a sales pitch to an audience that gets distracted by something in the sky, presumably as the impending danger of this mysterious UFO starts to get a little too down to Earth.
Why ‘Nope’ gave Keke Palmer ‘a lot of anxiety’
In 2021, plot details for Nope were still being kept under tight wraps. This apparently brought Palmer “a lot of anxiety,” as she was forced to keep details about her character and the plot of the film top secret.
“It’s really stressful,” she told guest host Sean Hayes on an August 2021 episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live. “I’m not the kind of person that really holds a lot of secrets. I’m just like very out with it. It’s really bringing me a lot of anxiety even just talking about it right now because I know Jordan’s gonna be watching this.”
Palmer describes her relationship with Jordan Peele
Palmer met Peele for the first time when she was just 17 during an episode of Key & Peele. She played Malia Obama’s interpreter for one of the skits.
In the same Jimmy Kimmel Live interview, Palmer gushed over the experience. And she praised Peele for “really believing” in her ability to do comedy.
“It was so cool because it was the first time where I really thought, ‘Maybe I can have a little fun with some comedy,’” Palmer said. “He really believed in me and was pushing me to improv and stuff. And so then, 10 years later, here we are doing Nope.”
