A childminder from Plymouth has accidentally become TikTok famous after posting “silly videos” about how various household items would walk. However her first viral video proved controversial, having drawn criticism from some vegans.
Jane Mckennan, 64, donned a 50p Peppa Pig suit - which she originally bought for the children she looked after - to cook some bacon. Despite upsetting some, the video drew in some 1.5 million views.
Since then, her videos have only gone from strength to strength, with one where she pretends to arrive at a school reunion notching up a staggering 22 million views. She also entertained viewers in a quirky video which saw her perform a range of cheese-inspired walks - moving snootily like brie and doing a boxy walk for cheddar.
Having posted her first TikTok video in March 2021, the childminder of 30 years is quite incredulous about how her online fame has skyrocketed. Such is her newfound notoriety, she has even been scouted to appear on Britain’s Got Talent, an invitation she is keen to take up.
“Imagine watching Simon Cowell’s face if he saw me walking like a Mars bar or something,” she laughed. Jane, who is happily single, worked as a childminder until July this year when two families she worked for relocated.
She credits her youthful humour as the potential reason behind her unexpected success. “It’s just crazy at my age,” she said.
“I think a lot of people my age might do grandmother cooking videos and a lot of people comment saying I’m really young in my ways, so they can relate to that.
“I think everyone is quite surprised about how I think. Maybe I’ve got a childish sense of humour.”
Jane goes by the username ‘The Devon Maid’, due to having lived in Plymouth, Devon, for three decades and ‘maid’ being an old-fashioned slang term for ‘girl’. However, not everyone has been pleased with her antics.
She admitted: “I get mainly positive comments but I get some trolls saying, ‘I hate you, old woman go to bingo or go knit’. They’re not going to change my life, they should go and do something more positive with theirs.”
Her resilience to unpleasantness was demonstrated during the backlash from her Peppa Pig video. Some viewers were not amused by Jane frying bacon dressed as the popular childhood character, while the audio introduced each of Peppa’s family members sizzling in the pan.
“You’re always going to get somebody who hates it,” she continued. “A vegan made a video about me saying that it isn’t funny to make fun of pigs being murdered for food.
“But my video wasn’t about cruelty to pigs, the pan wasn’t even alight and it was funny because a woman my age was in a kid’s Peppa Pig costume.”
With her childminder career seemingly behind her, Jane is now open to making TikTok her full-time job. The TikTok venture all began in early 2020 when a friend sent her some comedy videos, with no idea of what they were setting off, with Jane saying: “I just thought it was funny and I thought, ‘well I can do that’.”
She posted her first video soon after, where she mimed the words to ABBA’s Angel Eyes, but she soon realised the videos were trickier than first anticipated. “Filming my first TikTok video, my hands were shaking and I used to have the camera the wrong way round,” she said.
“It only got a few views, not even my friends and family watched it.” Her Peppa Pig video was posted in May and this boosted her profile, since going on to create no less than 43 videos with over a million views each.
Big hits have included ‘Gran Love Island’, where she recreated outfits from the ITV reality show, and relatable comedy sketches about everyday occurrences, such as thoughts we have queuing at the supermarket. Her mum, Margret, 90, has featured in some videos dancing, and Jane said: “I think she quite likes it. She tells all her friends.”
She added: “My cousin from London, who I don’t see apart from at weddings and funerals, wrote in a Christmas card to my mum that she watches Jane on TikTok. Some of my friends laugh about it, and I drag them in.
“But some of them don’t know why I’m on it – they say, ‘why do you do it, you silly thing’.” She has even been recognised when out and about in her home county of Devon, recalling: “I was on a train and then this group of young girls started looking at their phones then looking at me. They came over and said hello.
“I get people commenting saying they saw me in Penzance or I saw you at so and so. And I replied, ‘well, why didn’t you speak?’ They said, ‘oh, we were too shy’.
“I actually had one guy say that my walking videos help people who are deaf, which I never even thought about. With my walking ones, I use expressions and everything and it does the job for deaf people. So it’s using expressions without having to use words.”
Positive comments matter to Jane, admitting: “It makes me feel really good, sometimes I go, ‘why am I doing these silly videos?’ but then if you’re helping somebody, even if they’re silly videos, it’s worth it and cheers them up. The comments come from all around the world.
I had one from a young Polish girl the other day, and she said I made her day. Those sorts of things do make you feel good, and you’re bringing a smile to somebody’s face.”
