Keke Palmer says she still doesn't know who Dick Cheney is, years after viral meme
Keke Palmer still doesn't "know who this man is."
It's been about three years since the "Nope" actor inspired a viral meme when she said she didn't know who former Vice President Dick Cheney was during a lie detector test with Vanity Fair.
In a recent interview with the publication, Palmer revealed she has not learned anything about Cheney since.
"I didn't even honestly do the research," Palmer, 28, said. "I left him where he was at. I hate to say that. I really did."
She continued: "Everybody was like, It was Dick Cheney! And I’m like, still means nothing. The way people were coming up to me, telling me who he was, it seemed like he wasn’t worth me doing the research on."
In the initial 2019 interview, Palmer was asked if her character in the Nickelodeon show "True Jackson, VP" was a better fit for the role than Cheney.
But when she was presented with a photo of him, Palmer responded: "I hate to say it, I hope I don't sound ridiculous. I don't know who this man is. I mean, he could be walking down the street, I wouldn't know a thing. Sorry to this man."
The internet seized on the clip, with many using it to casually dismiss disgraced men and ex-lovers. Within a week, the video received more than 250,000 views, according to meme database Know Your Meme. It has now racked up over 1.5 million views on YouTube.
In the aftermath of its popularity, Palmer shared the clip on Instagram and wrote, "Twitter is killing me with the memes from this clip omg." She used the hashtag "#sorrytothisman."
Palmer said that getting meme'd is a "humbling feeling."
"I’m a very noncelebrity kind of person, meaning I don’t live my life very lavishly," she told Vanity Fair. "I have lavish moments, like we all do, but I don’t really exist in that space. So when those viral moments happen and people are saying, Oh, my gosh, that’s so me, I’m really happy that they are seeing me outside of their perception of what my life is, and just seeing me as a normal person, whether it’s somebody that reminds them of their sister, their brother, their friend. It really touches me. I’m just a normal person. I’m just an everyday girl."
Her soundbites continue to inspire meme fodder. "The internet? I live for the way that they are real-life comedians, girl," Palmer said.