Keke Palmer Hits Back At People Comparing Her Career To Zendaya

Keke Palmer has shut down ‘colourism’ comparisons to Zendaya and said she is creating her own career path.

The actor stars in Jordan Peele's new film, Nope, and fans believe this is finally her 'star is born' moment.

However, some people on social media questioned why it's taken so long for Palmer to reach this height when someone like Zendaya seemingly got there earlier.

Bizarrely, users suggested it was due to 'colourism'.

I'd like someone to do a deep-drive on the similarities and differences between Keke Palmer and Zendaya's careers. This may be one of the clearest examples of how colorism plays out in Hollywood. They were both child-stars, but their mainstream popularity is very different. https://t.co/Cmy1CXGQeI pic.twitter.com/etO27HVN0Y

— Melinda Eg (@NBAgladiator) July 23, 2022

Keke’s net worth is $7 million and Zendaya’s is $20 million. Keke has been a mainstream success since her career began and has put in substantially more work. She should be one of the HIGHEST paid entertainers in the game. So yes it’s colorism. https://t.co/LibCjKpJhE

— DEMEI JEANE BAGUETTE (@DEMEIMA) July 24, 2022

But the 28-year-old has taken to Twitter and slammed those comparing her to the Euphoria actor simply because they are both successful Black women in Hollywood.

She wrote: “A great example of colorism is to believe I can be compared to anyone. I’m the youngest talk show host ever. 

“The first Black woman to star in her own show on Nickelodeon, & the youngest & first Black Cinderella on broadway. I’m an incomparable talent. Baby, THIS, is Keke Palmer.”

A great example of colorism is to believe I can be compared to anyone. I’m the youngest talk show host ever. The first Black woman to star in her own show on Nickelodeon, & the youngest & first Black Cinderella on broadway. I’m an incomparable talent. Baby, THIS, is Keke Palmer.

— Keke Palmer (@KekePalmer) July 24, 2022

While the comparison boils down to a lack of representation in the media, Palmer comes with one of the most impressive resumes a young actor has ever seen.

She continued: “I’ve been a leading lady since I was 11 years old. I have over 100+ credits, and currently starring in an original screenplay that’s the number one film at the box office #NOPE. 

“I’ve had a blessed career thus far, I couldn’t ask for more but God continues to surprise me.”

Palmer's latest film is Jordan Peele’s Nope, which centres around two siblings who own a Californian horse ranch who discover something sinister looming in the sky and attempt to capture it on video.

Vulture says the film ‘delves into the scams of representation' and 'the dangers of Hollywood’s glimmer’.

While appearing on the TODAY show to promote the project, the director said that notion of race bleeds into many aspects of his filmmaking.

"I think it's impossible to make any movie without it being about race, because race is all around us," Peele said. 

"You can't have Black people in a flying saucer film and just have it be the same experience. It's not. There's a different relationship."

Peele added that part of exploring race through the artistic lens is subverting the audience’s expectations, spawned out of limiting Hollywood tropes.

“My race, I think, has informed my entire artistic journey, and part of it has been trying to reconcile the box, and the box is that this country puts people of colour in and trying to break out of that box,” he said.