Keke Palmer has shared how a celebrity actor salvaged her relationship with her parents. In an episode of The Toast podcast on Tuesday, the 31-year-old talked about how a message she got from actor Will Smith helped her patch up a strained relationship with her family.
Palmer touched on how she and her family found dealing with her newfound popularity challenging after her role in Akeelah and the Bee. She decided to talk to her lawyer about independence from her parents, but the lawyer tried to guide her towards therapy instead.
“Couple of weeks go by and I’m on the set of True Jackson, VP, and I get a call from this like really, really obscure number. And I’m like what? Like this is weird, I’m not answering this,” Palmer recounted on The Toast podcast, according to People.
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She recalled that after working for some time, she checked her phone again and discovered that the same number—which turned out to be Will Smith—had left her an unopened voicemail.
“Hey, Keke. It’s Will. We’re over here doing Karate Kid with Jaden and I just want to let you know that I talked [her lawyer]. He let me know everything you’re going through, and I want you to know sometimes it’s hard being the first, but you’ll get through.”
She added that he encouraged her to “Just keep staying focused, love on your family, and y’all gonna be good.”
In the end, Palmer decided not to pursue freedom from her parents, and she attributed this decision in part to Smith’s message on the phone.
She said, “It’s something that happens when you’re stepping out, and you could be a child entertainer, or you could be the first person in your family to go to college, or the first person in your family to get married. There’s so many firsts that can happen as the generations of your family continue to grow and evolve. And this was a difficult thing for me that I felt meant that I had to throw my family away.”
As a single mother, she conveyed her appreciation for her parents‘ efforts to help her during her developing stage.
“I do think that my parents did a really great job trying to explain to me what it was I was doing at these companies so I didn’t take things personal. How they make you feel about yourself and your work and how that is connected to your esteem are really important things to talk through. I think my mom did a really good job trying to help me process those things,” she said, per E News.
