Jimmy Kimmel appeared as a guest on Stephen Colbert’s show Tuesday night, and recounted the story of how ABC called to tell him he wouldn’t be doing a show…just an hour before they were to go live.
It was an emotional rollercoaster. I know you hear that a lot. It really was. It was very strange,” the comedian shared on the “Late Show With Stephen Colbert” Tuesday.
“Do you want to hear the whole thing?” Kimmel, 57, asked pal Stephen Colbert.
“It was around 3 o’clock, we tape our show at 4:30. I’m in my office typing away — as I usually do. I get a phone call. It’s ABC. They say they want to talk to me,” he began.
“This is unusual,” Kimmel continued. “As far as I knew, they didn’t even know I was doing a show previous to this. I have, like, five people who work in my office with me, so the only private place to go is the bathroom.
“So I got into the bathroom and I’m on the phone with the ABC executives,” Kimmel recalled. “They say, ‘Listen, we want to take the temperature down. We’re concerned about what you’re going to say tonight, and we’ve decided that the best route is to take the show off the air.’”
The late-night talk show host said he returned to his office and told his executive producers about the show’s suspension.
It was only days later that the Walt Disney Company announced that Kimmel’s show would return, which was never a given.