It’s like we share a brain: Keegan-Michael Key on his creative partnership with Jordan Peele

By PTI

NEW DELHI: Keegan-Michael Key’s collaboration with Jordan Peele has resulted in some of the most iconic shows and movies, and the Actor-screenwriter-comedian says he often believes that there are some magical forces at play when they work together.

Key and Peele were the brains behind the popular Comedy Central comedy sketch show “Key & Peele”, in which they covered a variety of topics such as American popular culture, ethnic stereotypes, social awkwardness and race relations.

In the show, which ran for five seasons from 2012 to 2015, the duo impersonated a wide world of people, including world leaders like former US president Barack Obama and American basketball player Michael Jordan.

Besides “Key & Peele”, they also worked together on the first season of Netflix’s “Fargo” and the 2016 action-comedy film “Keanu”, which they produced and starred in.

“The collaboration I have with Jordan, for the most part there was a bit of magic to it really that I sometimes feel like I can’t even really explain.”

“A lot of it has to do with our training which was from the same place. We were trained, ostensibly, by the same people. So from a training standpoint, it’s like we share a brain,” Key told PTI in a Zoom interview.

Key, who attended Penn State’s School of Theater and received a Masters of Fine Arts, met Peele, who has become more popular for his horror classics such as “Get Out” and “Us” in recent years when he was training at the famed comedy improvisation theatre group, The Second City.

After that, they both featured together in the ninth season of comedy sketch show “Mad TV”.

He and Peele were cast against each other, but both ended up being picked after demonstrating great comedic chemistry.

Key said one of the reasons for their partnership being successful is because they both bring their unique talents to it and are comfortable with each other’s ideas.

“We also brought our own unique talents to it. I approach everything really from character and Jordan very often approaches things from a little farther away from story and plot.

“That proved to be very helpful that we both had those separate disciplines and it ended up being really wonderful,” the 50-year-old actor said.

And though Peele is now busy with his filmmaking career, Key said they have another project on the anvil.

“We actually are working on a film right now. It’s an animated film and that’s all the details I can really share at this moment.

“It’s something that Jordan has co-written with somebody else. We’re in the process of making that right now. It’s been a lot of fun. That’s kind of been our new modus operandi is that we have been doing a few animated films together,” he added.

Key most recently voice starred in “Hotel Transylvania: Transformania”, which currently streams on streaming service Prime Video.

The animated movie is the fourth and final instalment of the “Hotel Transylvania” franchise and Key voices the character of Murray, an ancient mummy.

Key said it is a joy to play animated characters as he likes to provide them their own unique voice.

“I like doing characters where the voice doesn’t sound anything like my voice. That’s always fun for me when you have to tell somebody about the voice of that character, ‘oh, that’s Keegan Michael Key.’ That means that you have succeeded in a way that you’ve really kind of given a very unique voice to a character and it belongs solely to them.

And then every time you make a new one of these movies, you get back into that zone again with that voice.

And that’s a very pleasing thing,” he added.

The actor said he remains hopeful that the “Hotel Transylvania” franchise will continue beyond the fourth movie.

“I’m in a little bit of denial about it. It’s like when a person does their last music tour and then they go, this is the last tour and then they come back with another album. That’s my hope. I hope that we make a fifth one and maybe even a sixth one.”

“Hotel Transylvania: Transformania” also features the voices of Brian Hull (Drac), Selena Gomez (Mavis), Andy Samberg (Jonathan), Jim Gaffigan (Van Helsing), Kathryn Hahn (Ericka), Steve Buscemi (Wayne), Molly Shannon (Wanda), David Spade (Griffin the Invisible Man).