Keegan-Michael Key returns as substitute teacher Mr. Garvey to school Peppa Pig, Dora the Explorer, and more
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Ya done messed up, D'rah.
Keegan-Michael Key reprised his Key & Peele role as Mr. Garvey, an inner-city substitute teacher who has trouble pronouncing the names of his middle-class white students, for a new Paramount+ ad.
While atop Paramount Mountain, Mr. Garvey prepares to teach some of Paramount+'s most beloved stars essential survival skills. He begins with a tense roll call with a mix of animated and human characters, including Peppa Pig, Dora the Explorer, and Aaahh!!! Real Monsters' Krumm, among others.
"All right, let's do this roll call. It's freezing up here," Mr. Garvey says, before calling out Blah-zay. "Where you at, Blah-zay?" Blaze, from Blaze and the Monster Machine, says, "It's Blaze!" Mr. Garvey replies, "So y'all want to play, huh? Well guess what? I'm not animated. I'm for real."
Other botched names include Big Knotty (Big Nate, from the series of the same name), Bee-louie (Blue, from Blue's Clues), Kay-room (Krumm), D'rah (Dora, from Dora the Explorer), and, in a callback to the original sketch, A-A-Ron (Aaron Donald, Rams football player). "Here coach," Donald replies.
"The two most popular sketches in Key & Peele history are both about names: 'Substitute Teacher' and the 'East/West College Bowl,'" Key said of the 2012 sketch in EW's "Substitute Teacher" oral history with the cast and crew. "I think it has to do with [the fact that] ownership of your being is connected to your name, and if you've ever had your name pronounced incorrectly, it's something that resonates. That's my unscientific, unproven theory as to why it continues to bring joy."
"During the pitch meeting, once the premise was announced, the whole writers' room — it was like sharks in a frenzy after some chum had been dumped in the water," Key said. "Everybody had an example of a name that they thought could work."
Watch Key reprise his role as Mr. Garvey in the kooky commercial above.
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