On March 10, Robert Kelly’s kids crashed his live BBC interview, bringing the internet a whole lot of joy and even turning their family into a meme. Now, the family is talking about what really happened that day and proving that kids shake up your life in the most unexpected ways.
The Wall Street Journal interviewed Kelly, a political science professor and an authority on international relations in East Asia, and his wife, Jung-a Kim. It turns out Kelly forgot to lock his office door before his interview with the BBC about the removal of South Korean president Park Geun-hye. This allowed his kids, 4-year-old Marion and 8-month-old James, to make their hilariously timed guest appearances while Kim was watching the interview her husband was giving on TV and recording it with her phone from the other room. The delay on the TV meant she didn’t realize the kids had made it into the office until they were already on camera.
“It’s a comedy of errors,” Kelly told The Wall Street Journal. Kim said “it was chaos” for her.
And what about Marion’s special strut into the room? Kelly said she was in a “hippity-hoppity mood” after having her birthday party at school.
Kelly told The Wall Street Journal that he initially declined after the BBC asked if they could post a clip of the interview (and after he wrote to apologize). He and Kim eventually decided to give the OK, though. He described the video, which has racked up millions of views across the internet, as “terribly cute.” Many people on Twitter agreed.
Kelly also pointed out how well his wife handled the unexpected situation and explained that his kids were just being kids.
“My wife did a great job cleaning up a really unanticipated situation as best she possibly could ... it was funny,” he told The Wall Street Journal. “If you watch the tape I was sort of struggling to keep my own laughs down. They’re little kids and that’s how things are.”
Read what else Kelly and Kim had to say about the incident on The Wall Street Journal.
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