‘Nope’: Jordan Peele Praised Keke Palmer For ‘Tour de Force’ Introductory Monologue
Actor Keke Palmer is joining Jordan Peele’s horror movie universe with Nope. He previously made Get Out and Us, where he collaborated with actors giving extraordinary performances. However, Peele pointed out how much Palmer impressed him with her work in Nope. She reportedly gave a “tour de force” performance in the introductory monologue that required her to do more than a dozen takes with different styles.
Keke Palmer stars as Emerald Haywood in ‘Nope’
Nope follows a group of residents, including OJ (Daniel Kaluuya) and Emerald Haywood (Palmer), who live in inland California. However, they begin to experience strange phenomena in the lonely gulch. A mysterious force is proving to affect human and animal behavior in strange ways that no one would imagine in their wildest dreams.
Peele won an Oscar for his tremendous Get Out script and was highly successful at the box office with Us. However, Nope has the potential to reach great heights, as well. Kaluuya previously starred in the filmmaker’s directorial feature debut, but Nope will be the first time that Palmer gets the opportunity to work with him.
Jordan Peele praised Keke Palmer for her ‘tour de force’ monologue
Indiewire interviewed Peele and Palmer about their experience working on Nope together. The actor’s high-energy monologue was partially the star of the promotional materials, but it also makes an impact on the full-length feature itself. Peele absolutely gushed about how she managed to deliver the monologue on the set.
“Very early in the movie, when we meet Emerald, she comes in as this real breath of fresh air, in that she saves the day and injects this energy into this safety meeting that she is giving to this crew of a commercial,” Peele said. “Keke came in and did, I don’t know, probably about 14 takes. Each one of them really very wildly different, uncuttably so. But just a tour de force, one of these things where you see somebody like, ‘I’m going to make this choice this time and go for it.’ There’s improv in there.”
Peele continued: “I said, ‘Look, this is something you have to know like the back of her hand,’ which is the worst thing you could say to an actor who’s got to memorize a little monologue. You’ve got to know it like you’ve done it 50 times. And so she came in, the best kind of overprepared, where she was ready to go.”
Peele ultimately managed to select one take of Palmer’s Nope monologue, but it was quite difficult to pick his favorite one.
The actor plans to work with Jordan Peele again in the future
Palmer told Indiewire that they filmed the monologue at the very end of a long day of filming, which wasn’t part of the original script. Additionally, they didn’t have much time for her to get it right, so she had to really get it right.
“Keke’s amazing in this movie,” Peele said. “Can I just say, so that everyone knows it, but it’s been one of the great joys working with her on this movie. Such a big part of it is both of us was pushing ourselves further and sort of making this agreement early that we’re going to go farther than we ever have gone. I would just say, everything you want Keke to be in your head, she’s better. She’s that and more.”
Peele confirmed that he will join forces with Palmer again after Nope on another project that the world has yet to hear of.
