Many people first came to know Keke Palmer as the pre-teen spelling whiz in “Akeelah and the Bee” in 2006.
A few months before the drama film’s release, “Madea’s Family Reunion” began showing in theaters. Directed, written, and produced by Tyler Perry, at age 11, Palmer played the role of Nikki, a young girl who became Madea’s foster daughter.
Nearly two decades after “Madea’s Family Reunion” was released, Palmer is continuing to show gratitude to Perry for the acting gig. While the media mogul was a guest on the longtime actress’ podcast, “Baby, This Is Keke Palmer,” she recalled the movie set and cast feeling like a family.
“Everybody felt like my aunties and uncles and cousins and just family and friends,” Palmer expressed to Perry. “That was a great experience.”
Palmer also recalled how Perry went above and beyond when it came to the check she received from the film.
“That was the first time that I have ever been in a movie, and it introduced this for me in business,” Palmer said. “And I thank you so much for this, where whatever the movie did you gave me extra money in the backend and that’s big.”
She continued, “I really wanted to point that out because that’s not something that people are always doing, and that was very early on in my career. I was no big name or anything like that. It was not necessarily something that was my birthright, but for that to happen in that movie and for it to have been such a success — that extra money, what it did for my family and how it allowed me to maintain my time in California, moving from Chicago, (IL). I mean we had nothing, and for you to do that it was just really amazing so I just wanted to mention that ‘cause I never forgot that.”
According to IMDb, “Madea’s Family Reunion” made over $63 million worldwide.
Shortly after her role in Perry’s film, Palmer went on to land starring roles such as on “True Jackson, VP,” which aired from 2008-2011. According to The Richest, she earned $20,000 per episode of the Nickelodeon show — making her the fourth-highest-paid child star on television at the time.
Seeing a trailblazer like Perry at a young age played a role in setting the tone for how Palmer wanted to move as not just an entertainer but an entrepreneur, she says. After seeing how lucrative the digital space could be rather than traditional media, she took “a real bet” on herself and self-funded KeyTV, a digital network that provides a platform for Black and brown creators’ content, as previously reported by AFROTECH™.
Within two decades, Palmer went from having “nothing” to building a reported net worth of $7.5 million, per Celebrity Net Worth. While she claimed on “360 With Speedy” that the number isn’t accurate, she made it clear that her financial position continues to grow, as previously shared by AFROTECH™.
“It’s inaccurate. There’s been times where it was less. Now, it’s more,” Palmer told host Speedy Morman.
She added, “The cup runneth… God is good.”
