Fact Check: Is the viral Jason Derulo Met Gala photo real? Post debunked

It looks like the rumor about singer Jason Derulo falling down the stairs at the Met Gala might not die anytime soon. The joke has been emerging every year at the gala since 2015, and 2023 is no different. Twitter is once again filled with rumors that the 33-year-old tripped and fell down the stairs during the 2023 Met Gala, which was held on May 1, 2023. However, the rumors are untrue as not only did Derulo not trip down the stairs, but he wasn't even in attendance at the event.

The viral image of someone falling down the stairs on a red carpet had become a very popular meme by now. Nearly every year, people share the image after the gala, and social media is rife with claims that the person in the image is Jason Derulo.

In 2023, it was the Twitter page @PopCulture2000s that shared the image on Tuesday, May 2. However, a reader's context was also added under the image which set the record straight that the image was a common joke that didn't happen in reality.

As mentioned earlier, Jason did not tumble down the stairs of The Metropolitan Museum of Art on Monday, May 1, 2023. In fact, he did not even attend the event this year.

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Internet reacts to the age-old joke about Jason Derulo at Met Gala

While most people knew that it was a joke about Jason falling down the stairs at the Met Gala, some decided to play along with it and create memes. However, others who weren't aware of the long-running joke, and believed that the singer had actually tripped and were worried about him.

As they responded to @PopCulture2000s post, people said that they hoped that Derulo was okay as they noted that his suit looked great.

A few people jokingly started making red-carpet edits, including BTS members Jungkook, Taehyung, and Jimin. They even added their own funny versions to the viral Jason Derulo meme.

However, a few others also clarified the whole ordeal of the meme and how it originated. They also confirmed that the man in the white suit and pants in the image is not Jason. Rather, he has never attended the Gala. The internet has been trolling the Swalla hitmaker since 2015.

The viral photograph was not taken at the Met Gala. It dates back to the 2011 Cannes Film Festival in France when a prankster tried to crash the event by attempting to perform a stunt and deliberately falling down the stairs. For some reason, he has since been misidentified as Jason Derulo every year.

The claim that the person falling in this image is Jason at the Met Gala started with a 2015 tweet by the now-suspended Twitter account @dashuasofijack. The claim then went viral and the image became a meme, which started to pop up during the Met Gala since then.

Back then, in 2015, when the joke first surfaced on the internet, Jason Derulo himself cleared the doubts. The Savage Love singer tweeted that he was not there at the event and was in Los Angeles for rehearsals.

While the man in the viral photo remains unidentified, the joke about Jason has persisted over the years. Contrary to these popular memes, no celebrity had, in reality, tripped on the stairs at the Met Gala.

Although by now everyone knows that the viral claim about Jason is false since he never even attended the gala, the meme seems to have become one of the internet's favorite Met Gala memes.