Khaby Lame started posting videos on TikTok in 2020 as a coping mechanism after being laid off from his factory machine labor job at the onset of the pandemic. In videos of him silently doing things like applying butter to a pan, his deadpan humor gained him quick fame and earned him the label the “Gen Z Charlie Chaplin.”
Lame kept at it, and in just six years, the 25-year-old built a massive following, becoming the most popular creator on TikTok with more than 160 million followers on the platform. The last seven months have been downright Chaplinesque, as he saw himself deported from the U.S. and sealing a nearly billion-dollar business deal for his business and AI likeness.
