Jay Pharoah sat down with Conan O’Brien on TBS late-night show Conan to discuss his new film All My Life, as well as talk about why he believes he coined the term “Karen.”
The Saturday Night Live alum said the film is based off of an event that really happened in 2015 for Solomon Chau and Jennifer Carter, who became engaged and found out shortly after that the groom was diagnosed with cancer.
“They use all of the money for chemotherapy, so they are not going to have a wedding. So the community sees the story, they do a GoFundMe, they all donate, and they do this big wedding for this couple,” Pharoah said.
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The film also stars Harry Shum Jr. as Soloman “Sol” Chau and Jessica Rothe as Jennifer Carter.
Pharoah plays Sol’s close friend and best man, Dave. He touched on how audiences will be able to see him break out into a different genre.
“It’s a nice, sweet story. It’s another side of me. It’s a dramatic side… The whole message of the story is to enjoy life because you don’t know how long you have here, and that’s proven even with this year with COVID,” the SNL alum said.
Earlier in the interview, Pharoah revealed that he had been spending time in Africa on the island of Mauritius to escape the pandemic and learned about the election results abroad.
He then impersonated Vice President-elect Kamala Harris, Joaquin Phoenix, and brought back the Jay-Z impersonation he made popular on SNL.
The actor and comedian also claimed he was the first person to use the term “Karen,” when referring to White women.
“You coined the term ‘Karen’?” O’Brien asked the star.
“White women being a ‘Karen’, yes. I don’t know if there’s any other people before that,” Pharoah commented.
“I think I was the first one to do it a while ago—for the White women being named Karen, because you know I grew up in the suburbs, so I’m used to that. I mean there [were] always Karens around me when I was growing up,” he continued, “…them talking is Black people, neighbor repellent.”
All My Life was released on Dec. 4. Variety reports Universal released the film in theaters first and will release it on digital rental services on Dec. 23.
Watch a full clip of Pharoah’s interview below: