I just installed and tested making a keyboard shortcut for VLC on Zorin OS lite.
I set the command as /usr/bin/vlc and it launched.
If you are getting a Root permissions issue, you might try running this command in terminal
sudo sed -i 's/geteuid/getppid/' /usr/bin/vlc
Then log out and in and try launching using your shortcut for /usr/bin/vlc