Keke Palmer Dials Back the Spice Level

After a month of letting romance speculators speculate about her relationship status with the man known by all as the “Hot Ones guy” (aka Sean Evans), Keke Palmer is clearing some things up. She’s not in love. The chicken wing torture artist is simply her “work husband.”

So what, she was caught having a romantic Brooklyn dinner date with him? Or that she told the entirety of Jay Shetty’s Cannes Lions panel that she and Evans were indeed “hanging out?” That doesn’t mean she married the guy. On Monday, Palmer made an appearance on Today and told hosts Sheinelle Jones and Jenna Bush Hager that the whole situation has left her feeling, and I quote, “gagged.”

“I was gagged that everybody was ready to marry me off,” she said. “I was like, ‘Guys, let it cook!’ They married your girl off in two seconds.” You heard Keke.

“Our chemistry is genuine,” Palmer said. “I couldn’t force that if I tried. We always felt that chemistry from the first time we did the show.” The two have indeed been having fun with the rumors since 2023, when Evans first revealed his crush on Palmer to his arch-chicken-rival, Amelia Dimoldenberg, on Chicken Shop Date. After that, Palmer appeared on his show again and asked him for a “quick smooch.” She also introduced him as her “potential future suitor” on an episode of her podcast, Baby This is Keke. But now, Keke admits, things might have gone too far—not with the romance, but with everyone else caring so much about it.

“I mean, for us, it’s life. Essentially we met at work, and we had chem… It’s like work husband/work wife, and you just had that chemistry with people. Then we hang out, and for people to then… they write the story before you can live it.” She did tell everyone at Jay Shetty’s Cannes Lions Panel that they were “hanging out,” which has certain connotations, but I see her point.

She went on to share a story about a fan who approached her as she was going through TSA and asked her about Evans: “I’m like, ‘Girl, you gotta let time pass. This just happened yesterday,’” she recalled. “It’s this thing that’s so parasocial, the world we live in now.”

The only way to put these rumors to rest once and for all would be to reunite Palmer and Evans for a third and final chicken-related interview (what say you, Scott Pelley?) and get a tell-all on what this relationship actually is. But for now, it seems like a work-husband situationship, and that’s all Palmer will allow us to (parasocially) have.

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