You know how the saying goes: When God closes one door, he makes you forget to lock another... which subsequently leads to your daughter busting in on a live Skype call to the BBC and making your entire family a viral sensation. At least, that's what happened to Professor Robert Kelly, the dad from the viral video of his kids interrupting a Skype interview that started making the rounds last Friday. After what must have been a busy weekend, Kelly and his wife Jung-a Kim returned to the BBC to discuss the impact the video's popularity has had on their family, and to answer the apparently burning questions of viewers who quickly championed them as the most hardcore-relatable family the internet had ever seen.
If you missed the video, it took place during a call in which Kelly, a political science professor and expert in East Asian Affairs, was discussing the impeachment of South Korean President Park Geun-hye via Skype on the BBC. The video starts out unremarkable enough, with Kelly discussing the ramifications for the region, when his young daughter suddenly walks in and starts hamming at the camera. Kelly continues the interview as his infant son follows suit in a walker, and is then subsequently chased by Jung-a, who heroically manages to pull both kids out of the room with as little fanfare as possible (even as the BBC, for reasons unknown, does not pan the camera away from Kelly).
If you're a parent — or really, if you've ever been in charge of a toddler for more than eight seconds — you'll find this video relatable as all hell.
Of course, over the next few days, as the video went on to accumulate over 16 million views, more than a few debates and even controversies about the video started flying, from the hilarious (Trevor Noah posited that Kelly didn't get up because he wasn't wearing any pants) to the unfortunate (many people assumed that Jung-a was the babysitter, rather than the children's mother and Kelly's wife). On Tuesday, Kelly and his newly famous family were invited back onto BBC News with James Menendez to tell their side of this past week's shenanigans.
First thing's first: The family is doing fine, and while Kim said the weekend was "stressful," they are learning to laugh about it. They've shared the video with other family members, who have also seen the humor in the situation — even if they are surprised by the viral attention it has gotten. In fact, rather than worrying it would go viral, the couple shared that at first they worried it would compromise Kelly's relationship with the BBC: "We laughed a lot, but we were worried a little bit more," Kim explained with a smile.
The BBC's James Menendez then asked about the nanny controversy, and how they felt about it.
"Yeah, we were pretty uncomfortable with it," said Kelly.
"I hope people just enjoy it, and not argue over this thing," said Kim, "because I'm not [the] nanny, that's not true."
The "arguing" Kim referred to has been a lot of talk over the past few days about racial stereotyping, and the role it might have played in people assuming she was the nanny. Before a source confirmed that she was in fact the mother of the children in the clip, many viewers took to analyzing her behavior and using it to justify whether or not they believed she was the nanny — the problem being that many of those justifications were rooted in stereotypes, as writer and actor Vera Chok pointed out in an article for The Guardian.
Overall, though, the world's new favorite family is doing quite well, and laughing about the viral video in hindsight. And because you know you all were wondering, Kelly confirmed: "Yes, I was wearing pants."
Case officially closed.
To watch their full video interview with the BBC, visit their website here.
