Screenwriter, director, actor, singer, comedian, host, superstar – baby, that’s Keke Palmer.

With Big bossout now, the legendary multi-hyphen and Shine cover star makes her directorial debut, spearheading a new highly personal visual album. Palmer also wrote the script for the project, much of which was based on her experience growing up in show business, navigating her relationships with her family outside of a grueling professional schedule, and her tumultuous time working with toxic music label executives who tried to tell. her what kind of artist she can be.

“I ended up writing the story that I didn’t even know I wanted to tell,” says Palmer, “which was my musical journey and everything that I experienced and learned and felt, and how the different narratives I told myself stopped me from being able to live in this very expressive, creative flow.”

Palmer’s talent as a performer was evident from an early age – she had striking solos in her local church choir at just five years old, and was not yet a teenager when she made her film debut in 2004’s Barbershop 2: Back in Business. In 2006, she had her breakout acting role Akeelah and the bee, which won her Best Actress awards at the NAACP Image Awards and the Black Reel Awards. A year later, she released her debut album, i’m uncool by Atlantic Records.

Her rise to film and music stardom has been meteoric ever since. Among her most notable roles, to name just a few: the title character in the Nickelodeon sitcom True Jackson: VP; the youngest talk show host in history with her BET series Just Keke; the first Black actor to play Cinderella on Broadway; and most recently a starring role in Jordan Peele’s award-winning horror film Nope. An Emmy winner, she holds several NAACP Awards, a BET Award, and a New York Film Critics’ Circle Award—and all of those awards barely scratch the surface of her accomplishments.

Since i’m uncool the 29-year-old has released several mixtapes and EPs, both independently and through labels including Island and Interscope. Now she’s back with her latest studio album, big boss, and its accompanying film, an ambitious, bold and beautiful mix of genre and visual styles that has already won the award for best musical film at the Vienna Independent Film Festival.