Have you ever failed at something you really wanted?
What did that experience teach you about yourself?
Today, Jay chats with late-night legend Jimmy Kimmel for an unforgettable live conversation at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles. Jimmy opens the episode playfully roasting Jay, showing off his signature, sharp wit right out of the gate. The laughs quickly give way to a candid, wide-ranging conversation about Jimmy’s life, marked by gutsy decisions, constant reinvention, and moments of surprising vulnerability.
Jimmy reflects on the emotional cost of self-expression, his early struggles with being misunderstood, and how persistence (and a healthy dose of delusion) helped him find his place in the world. Jimmy shares how anxiety has shaped his life, from growing up without much money to now being someone people rely on for support, advice, and even financial help. From outrageous pranks and career missteps to a touching tribute to his prank-loving Aunt Chippy, Jimmy constantly balances humor with disarming honesty. Jimmy also opens up about the challenges of becoming more emotionally available, how therapy has helped him grow, and how being a father, and now a grandfather, has reshaped his priorities and softened his edges.
In this interview, you'll learn:
How to Stay True to Yourself
How to Use Humor as a Tool for Healing
How to Keep a Lifelong Passion Alive
How to Stay Grounded When Success Finds You
How to Cope With Anxiety Through Creative Outlets
How Helping Others is the Key to Healing Yourself
It’s not about being perfect, it’s about being honest, showing up, and continuing to try. Whether through meaningful conversations, creative expression, or simply sharing space with others, healing and connection are always within reach.
With Love and Gratitude,
Jay Shetty
Join over 750,000 people to receive my most transformative wisdom directly in your inbox every single week with my free newsletter. Subscribe here.
What We Discuss:
00:00 Intro
04:44 Why is Putting Yourself Out There So Hard?
08:00 Discovering What Truly Drives You
09:19 The Origins of Jimmy’s Legendary Pranks
11:56 When the Pranks Never Stop
17:02 Failed Firings and Conversations That Went Sideways
18:30 Staying True to Your Creative Voice
21:42 Becoming a Grandfather for the First Time
25:55 Living With Anxiety: How It Shapes Family Life
27:29 Jimmy’s Take on Managing Anxiety
29:56 What It’s Like to Face Financial Pressure
31:17 How Jimmy Met the Love of His Life
32:31 Is Finding Love in LA Really That Hard?
33:17 The Secret to a Strong and Lasting Marriage
38:19 Why Talking About Your Feelings Is So Tough
39:16 What To Do When You’re Feeling Low
43:05 Jimmy on Final Five
Episode Resources:
Jimmy Kimmel | Instagram
Jimmy Kimmel | Facebook
Jimmy Kimmel | YouTube
Jimmy Kimmel | X
Jimmy Kimmel | TikTok
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
It feels selfish sometimes to be happy. It's hard to
figure out to be happy. There's no logical reason why
we should be happy. It doesn't make sense. Jimmy Chevill's
been hosting his late night show for over twenty years.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Jimmy, you don't do a lot of interviews. What does
it feel like to be on the other side?
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Putting yourself out there is hard? I started in radio.
You're already halfway hidden and nobody sees you. You don't
have an audience there to not laugh if you're not funny.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
When everyone's firing you, letting go of you, telling you
this isn't a great idea. How do you hold on
to an idea when everyone's telling you it's terrible?
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Pure delusion?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Has Talking about your emotion has always been something that
you found challenging.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
And I feel like I've matured a lot thanks to
my wife.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
In what way?
Speaker 1 (00:48):
No, don't ask her, Oh she's standing, she wants to
be asked? Oh, all right? Before she gets up here, Jay,
I should just say.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
You've been very open about your son's heart condition, and
that's been something that I imagine is extremely difficult.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
To stop and think about someone else and their child
the number one Health and Well in his podcast Jay
Setty Jay Shetty Jet.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
All right, I'm so excited to be here tonight at
the Greek in LA with the One and Onney, Jimmy Gimble.
Make some noise everyone, Thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Thank you for having me. Jay. I want you to
know that my first question, as it always is, because
I'm never I'm interested. I was watching you and when
you have people stand up, and you said, stand up
if you've ever worried about how you looked, and I
was thinking, I was wondering because I couldn't see the
audience if anyone didn't stand, because I think everybody and
if there was a person who's never worried about how
(01:53):
they looked, that's the person I want to hang out
with after the show. But I said, what is the dress?
You know what is the because you know I want
to fit in. They said it's elevated casual. I was like,
all right, well, okay, I'll find something that seems to
fit that category. And then I come here and you
are just like Adam Sandler.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I'm not wearing shorts. It's just not wearing shorts.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Is technically elevate And what is it elevate from I
don't know what this is, but I assume what you
want to go to seven eleven. There's nothing. This is
just casual.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
This is not this is interesting level.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Casual is what it is.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Jimmy, this is not the roast of.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
I was told differently.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I think you're at the wrong event. I think we're
gonna see you stand up.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
If you've ever eaten a whole pizza by yourself.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Jimmy, with three minutes in and you started roasting me already,
I'm sorry, it's my nature.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
I was telling you. I was why it was confusing
to me, because you're talking to these people, and everybody's
got these great stories, and you're hypnotizing them with your eyes.
I know what you do. You know, like eighty five
percent of this audience is here in the hope they
might get to have sex with you, right, That's why
I showed up.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
So how does this go, Jimmy? How does that work
between me and you? What sex? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Well, when a host and his guests fall very much
in love, they go into the dressing room and I'll
show you from there.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
Yes, that's right. My wife would not approve. Thank you
so much. That's the only reason. Thank you so much.
I appreciate, Jimmy. You don't do a lot of interviews,
but you.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
No one wants to talk to me.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
You agreed to do this one? Why now?
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Why here?
Speaker 2 (03:57):
And what does it feel like to be on the
other side.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
First of all, my wife loves you, and so I've
become exposed to you your magic. We have some mutual friends,
and really, I said to my wife, I said, hey,
Jay Shetty asked me if I would do his show.
I said, what do you think? She said, well, I'd
like to hear you on that and I said, all right,
well you're not listening to me at home, so maybe
(04:23):
maybe we can accomplish something.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Well, it makes the magic happen. Where is she?
Speaker 1 (04:26):
I he is here, but I don't know where she's sitting.
She may be If you guys, this happened right on
a card? What do you think of her? We'll hand
them to her.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Thank you for making this happened, Jimmy. Let's start there. Actually,
you know, tonight has been all about what we don't
do because of what people think of us. The things
we worry that people are perceiving about us, the judgments,
the criticisms, that people have of us. Talk to me
about the time in your life when you really felt
like prison by that.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
If ever, oh, very much so all the time, not
just I mean really honestly, Like if I'm at an
event and I'm not dressed properly, I feel In fact,
I went to a wedding recently. A very good friend
invited me to be in his wedding party, and he
was not great with the details of the party. But
again another dress code situation. This one was festive attire,
(05:24):
which means nothing to me. And I was in the
wedding party and I wore what I thought was festive attire,
and I showed up and everyone else was in a
black suit, and so I'm the idiot in all these
wedding photos and that, you know, that's I feel uncomfortable
with the simple things like that. But I you know,
putting yourself out there is hard. And I'm not talking
(05:47):
about show business necessarily. I think that there are a
lot of people that I've known over years and years
who are really good at something, and you tried your
best to encourage them to do that thing that they're
good at, and they're either going to do it or
they aren't. And sometimes for them, you saying they're good
at it is enough. That's enough for them, and they
(06:11):
don't want to threaten that idea. They don't want you
to ever think, oh, you weren't good at that, so
they leave it. And I think that's to me, that's
so sad that people will do that, because I do
think that there are so many people who know they
have this potential or this talent or whatever it is,
and they just they don't use it because they don't
(06:34):
want to be proven otherwise because everyone in their little
circle thinks it and they don't want to change their minds.
And I know that's an inelegant way of saying it,
but you just really need to do it. You have
to do it. And I for me, I was fortunate
because I started in radio, and when you're on the radio,
you're already halfway hidden and nobody sees you. You don't
(06:58):
have an audience there to not laugh if you're not funny,
so you just kind of have to assume you were
and you keep going. And I was able to take
baby steps from being on the radio to being the
sidekick on a game show to being a partner on
a comedy show to eventually doing my own show, and
(07:19):
I'm not sure if I would have been able to
take that big leap. I was fortunate, really genuinely fortunate
and very lucky to have been in a situation where
I could take those steps one by one. Oh yeah,
I mean it's just a lot of it is luck.
You know. That's the other thing that is a sad truth.
But a lot of it is luck. Now you have
(07:41):
to be ready when you get that moment where you
are lucky, when you have that moment of fortune, you
have to be prepared and you have to do whatever
it is that you need to do to accomplish whatever
goal you would like to accomplish. But still, luck is
a big part of it.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Yeah, I want to get to that, but I want
to I want to go backwards a little bit because
I read somewhere that you actually grew up wanting to
be a scientist.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
No, no, I don't know where you read that, But
that is false.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Was I farting into ziploc bags and leaving them under
my sister's pillow? Yes, if that, if that's what you
consider to be science, I wanted to be a scientist,
but no, science was never my thing. I wanted to
be an artist. When I was a kid, I like
to draw. That was my thing. I wanted to drawing. Yes,
I would you draw. I draw my classmates, which they
(08:35):
never liked. I would draw anything, superheroes when I was
a little kid, caricatures of people. I'd draw my family.
I draw David Letterman on the television as I was
watching him. Pretty much. I still to this day if
i'm if I have a pen and a piece of paper,
I'll just scribble whatever whoever is sitting in front of
(08:57):
me as we're sitting there.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Wow. And so you still do it today?
Speaker 1 (09:00):
I do?
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Have you done it on the show?
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Ever? A couple of times? It's hard to be funny
and draw at the same time. They're like, they're totally
different parts of your brain. They definitely got that wrong.
The media never gets anything wrong, right, So yeah, this
scientist in this case, it's your fault in this case.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
I'm always fascinated by what people wanted to be when
they were growing up and then what they end up becoming,
because I think there's so much hidden in childhood and
there's so many experiences, so many things we hear say
the subjects we study at school. But you've had this
history of pranks always being a central pillar, and for
most of us, maybe you did a few pranks when
(09:39):
you were a kid. How many of you did some
pranks when you were kids? Are your pranks? Yeah, all right,
a few of you. I did a lot of pranks
when I was kids, but sometimes you leave those behind.
But you actually lost jobs because you did pranks on
your colleagues, Yeah, yeah, bosses.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Right, all right, it's just going to be where I
crack open this June and there's a cocker roach in
it or something like that because you plaunted it. Because
this is sabotage, there's a prank. Yeah, I love pranks.
I think the reason that I love pranks is because
I grew up in a family that would scream and
yell when I did something, and I got a great
reaction out of it. I mean, really, if you don't
(10:16):
want to be pranked, just don't react. That's the way
to go. But I grew up. My aunt Chippy is
a very loud woman. She is on my show regularly.
We are still she's eighty five years old. Most recently,
I started by putting little explosive in her cigarettes. And
tying cans to the back of her car, and she
(10:36):
would go to work, or she'd be in the casino
in Las Vegas smoking and pow the cigarette would blow up,
and then she'd call and curse me out over the phone.
And I loved it. And now that I have a
TV show, I'm able to escalate. So a couple of
months ago, this has been a dream of mine since
I saw those Waymo cars. She doesn't know about these
(11:00):
lives in Las Vegas, and she's never seen a self
driving car. So I had a guy pretend to be
a chauffeur in a Waymo car pick her up at
the airport. He gets out of the car, he opens
the door for her. He says, I have to you
might have to use the restroom and then we'll go.
She's like, yeah, no problem, go ahead. He closes the
door of the car and off it goes. And there
(11:27):
was some real concern that this might kill her because
she's eighty five. So I wrote to each of her daughters,
my three cousins. I said, listen, here's the one I'm
planning to do your mother, and I need your permission
beforehand because I don't want to kill her. On TV
and if I do I need someone to blame. Within seconds,
(11:47):
they all said, oh, definitely do it. Definitely do it.
So we've got a sick family, but a fun family.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
But talk to me about when you won't you didn't
have the reason is to put it off your own
show and you were losing jobs of a pranking your bosses. Yeah,
first of all, where does the audacity come from? And
second of how do you keep doing it? I believe
it wasn't just once.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
I wouldn't call it audacity so much as I would
call it stupidity. I thought that I was a dish jockey.
I did a morning radio show, and I worked at
a lot of radio stations in a lot of cities.
If you've lived in the city, I've probably had a
job and been fired in that city. And each time
(12:31):
I thought the bosses would be on board with the
idea that the listeners would think it was funny if
I was torturing them, because then they could drive their
work and go I love hearing this. These guys screw
at their bosses. I wish I could do that, but
I'm enjoying it through them, and they never liked it
at all. They would tell me they were gonna like
(12:52):
it when they hired me, and then when it happened,
they hated it. Just dumb stuff. Once we were golfing
and I latched their golf bags on the back of
the carts and then forgot about it for like six
holes and then ran over their golf clubs. Once I
completely smashed the inside of a hot dog. It's a
(13:15):
long story, but there was a hot dog that he
didn't eat, and he threw in the garbage, and every
night I would sneak in and put it in his
drawer in his desk. And each day he'd open his
desk and there'd be a hot dog in there, and
he didn't know why, and he'd throw in the garbage again.
And then each time I would get in there and
I'd put it back in the desk. And then he
(13:38):
started locking his office. And so I climbed in over
the you know the offices have that like kind of
really cheap ceiling. I lowered myself in, and as I
lowered myself completely, the desk collapsed, the shelves collapsed. It
(13:58):
looked like the North rich earthquake had happen only in
his office. I knew that I'd be fired if he
found out. So I just got out of there and
locked the door, put the hot dog in before I left,
and never mentioned it again. I don't know what he
thought happened, but eventually they'd fire me. Eventually they'd have
(14:20):
enough of mine.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Now, how did that conversation go the firing? Was there
a conversation or you just go to messes like it would.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Go like this? Yeah, of course there were different situations,
but generally it would go so, you know how you
work here, Now tomorrow you won't be working here. And
in fact, we're gonna get a box, we're gonna go
in your office, or we're gonna get all your shit
and we're gonna walk you out to the parking lot.
I have to say to this day, I hate firing people.
(14:49):
It crushes me to fire somebody, even if they deserve it,
even if they've done something bad, because I've been fired
so many times and it sounds funny. These stories are
I know, I get that they're funny, but it wasn't
funny at all at the time. You know, I was
making like eighteen thousand dollars a year and then had
to go home and first of all, tell my wife
at the time that I'd been fired again for being
(15:12):
an idiot, and that we're gonna have to pack all
our stuff and move to Tucson. And that happened over
and over and over again, until eventually I found a
radio station here in La k Rock that valued my
commitment to nonsense. And I also grew up a little
(15:32):
and I learned like, Okay, don't call your boss's wife
at home on the air and dig into their personal life.
Those kind of lessons, those important lessons that you learn
along the way. And I was able to keep that
job until I got a job in television.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
I love your commitment to the prank.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
I have love things going on right now that would
blow your mind that I can't even talk about because
they're bubbling. But what my thing is my wife does
not like. When I my wife, I got her a
Did you know you can get a personalized license plate
for anyone's car?
Speaker 2 (16:07):
No, How does that explain that to me?
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Well, what you do is you fill out the forms
and then you forge the person's signature at the bottom,
and you right on the thing what you would like
their personalized license plate to be. In my wife's case,
I made it we be jamming, and then the license
plate came in the mail and I went out in
(16:32):
the garage and I screwed it onto the car and
I waited until she was you know, until she came
out to the car, and she wasn't happy. But I've
done that with a lot of people. My band leader,
who plays the saxophone, I made one that says send
youor saxy and I put that on his car. I
got the idea to you two concert. Somebody had a
(16:53):
license plate said you two fan. I thought, oh, okay,
maybe I'll do that in a bad way.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
What's a firing conversation that went wrong? What's the worst
time you've fired someone and you're like, oh, I shouldn't
have done it like that.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Oh well, one time it went on for like three
and a half hours. It was me because of me
and them crying and just kind of going around in
circles over and over again, and until finally I was like,
all right, I gotta go pick up my kids.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
That's the way you fired them. Then hugged them.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
Oh yeah, right, yeah, there's always some hugging involved. Yeah,
it's you know, it's not great. I got fired one
time and i'd been fired now so many times I
knew what was I knew was coming because the way,
do you know, is they stop yelling at you. And
once they stopped yelling at you, you're in trouble. They're like,
I forget and we don't why bother We're firing them
(17:48):
in three weeks. But I went in and it was
me and my partner on the radio, and they sat
us down. They said, listen, you know, we're going to
go in a different direction, and you know all that
bullshit that they say to you and probably best for
you guys too, And I'm thinking, no, it's not. And
then they gave the whole spiel and they were nervous,
and I said, listen, here's what we're going to do.
(18:09):
We're going to come to work on Monday morning and
we're going to pretend like none of this ever happened.
And there was a long moment of confused and terrified silence,
and then I started laughing and gave him the finger
and left.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
I think, before we dive into the next moment, let's
hear from our sponsors and back to our episode. On
a serious note, what's beautiful about that is you were
able to hold on to a really authentic part of
self expression. That was your comedy. It was something you
found funny. It was something that you really believed it
was something everyone would find funny. You didn't give up
(18:50):
on that. You were able to hold on to it
and find a place eventually that allows you to pull
off these crazy things. How did you stay true to
that when everyone's firing you, letting go of you, telling
you this isn't a great idea, it's pushing people the
wrong way. Like, how do you hold on to an
idea when everyone's telling you it's terrible.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Pure delusion? Just like a lot of the things I
thought were so funny weren't even funny, Like they weren't funny, Like,
you know, I wasn't that good at my job. And
I think that's an important thing too, because I look
back at these jobs and I go, well, it wasn't
all their fault, you know. Like on one hand, I
feel like maybe they should have recognized that I was
always a very hard worker and that I did have
(19:27):
some talent. I think every one of them would tell
you that. But on the other hand, like I was
kind of crazy, you know, I was doing anti social things,
and they didn't get it, and they didn't want to
deal with it. They were adults, and I was this asshole,
you know, this kid, and they didn't want to deal
with it. But I do have this thing where I
just kind of figure like, well, if I think it's funny,
(19:47):
then surely there will be other people that think it's funny.
And it applies to other people too. You know. One
of the best things about my job, and really about
even when I was on the radio, is I've been
able to identify and help other people who I saw
as talented and who didn't quite know how to do
it or make their way in or stay there once
(20:08):
they got in, And that to me is very sad.
Even just putting my aunt Chippy on television right now,
I'm not the first person to put one of their
relatives on television, but I just kind of looked around
and go like, well, I think she's funny, and so
I think other people will think she's funny. And the
same with my uncle Frank, her ex husband, who was
(20:31):
on my security guard on the show before Giermo was there,
and then they were there at the same time. He
was just this weird, very neurotic, very anxious former cop
from New York who only arrested six people in twenty
years and had this strange outlook on life where he
(20:52):
would take two hundred dollars out of his atm at
the beginning of the week and then he wanted to
have zero dollars in his wall at the end of
the week and it had to be that way, and
so if he had any money left in his wallet
on Sunday, he'd just give it to people, like strangers.
He just handed out to people. And he was always
doing this like weird stuff. And I, you know, at
(21:13):
one time, my band leader on my show is my
best friend since I was nine years old. We grew
up across the street from each other, and I didn't
know my relatives were funny until he thought they were funny.
I was like, Oh, they're annoying. They're always yelling at
each other. They're you know, so like, oh, they're coming over.
He's I said, my Aunt Chippy and Uncle Frank are
coming over. He's like, oh, can I come. I was
(21:34):
like what. He's like, Oh, they're hilarious. I was like
they are and that clicked for me. I was like, oh, yeah,
they are hilarious, and it turned out he was right,
and I've just kind of operated by that principle for
my whole life.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Yeah, talking about family, it just became a granddad too,
right I did.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
My daughter Katie had a baby, a baby girl. Probably
should have got more applause for that, but thank you.
I feel like almost killing my aunt Chippy got more
applause than having a granddaughter. But yeah, we're very excited.
(22:13):
She's what like maybe like eight days old or something. Yeah, yes,
smoking already, which we're we're concerned about.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
But how does that feel way? What is that like psychologically? Internally? Mentally?
Speaker 1 (22:27):
I feel like I don't know. People seem to think like,
first of all, people approach you cautiously in a way
about it, like, oh, so you're having like like I'm
gonna be upset about this? What kind of an asshole
would be upset about having her grandchild? But I guess
people don't want to be thought of as old, and
I don't really care that much about that. I'm just
(22:48):
excited to have a little and also being a grandparent.
I think it's gonna be, first of all, an incredible
way to get revenge on my children.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
Tell me, how, uh, what are the pranks that are bringing.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Not even pranks, just all the things they did to
me that they're gonna say. I know they're gonna go,
don't give please put them to bed before eleven o'clock,
you know, don't give them a bunch of Reese's pieces.
And I'm gonna nod, just like my parents do. And
then I'm gonna do all the shit they don't want
me to do. And I think that's one of the
(23:23):
grands where the circle of life, you know. But it's
fun and it's exciting, and it's strange to see my
daughter as a mom. I think that for me is
is that it's not really about how I feel, because
I've always felt like the same person. I feel like
I'm the same person I was when I was nine
years old. But to see like your daughter holding a
baby and smiling is it's, yeah, people know, it's great.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Yeah, absolutely give it up. It's it's beautiful to hear
about that, because yeah, it's uh, I've I have no experience.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
You have no grandchildren.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
I have kids, no grandkids, And it's really fascinating watching
someone you love grow into becoming someone else. Like you said,
it was strange watching her do it what are you
noticing in her that's that feels that way.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Well, she's breastfeeding, which she'd never done before. You know,
she's just seeing My daughter is very funny. All my
kids are really funny. My daughter, Katie is very funny.
She's got a very strange sense of humor. She's an artist.
She makes these funny ceramics. Her name is Katie Kimmel.
(24:32):
You could see her on Instagram and she you will
get you will understand what I'm talking about. She does
like today she sent me like I sent her a
text this morning and I said, you're not posting enough
pictures of the baby on the stream, And so she
just posted a bunch of pictures of the baby screaming
and crying, and the baby's wearing a onesie that says
(24:53):
I'm eleven years old. So I know she's gotta you know,
she's not going to be a traditional mom, but just
seeing or be a mom is is Uh, it's just funny.
It's it's I think it's like anything like when I
try to remember how old I am, I don't know
if you ever forget how old you are? Yeah, I
(25:14):
have to remember how old My sister is an ad
three years. That's how I get to it. And just
seeing my kids become adults and my both of my
older kids are married, and like having to pay rent
and to and be a husband and a wife is weird.
(25:34):
It's just weird. You know, it's great, but it's weird.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Yeah, they obviously inherited your comedic gene. It sounds like, yeah,
I know, I don't.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
I wouldn't necessarily classified as genius. But they are very
funny and they're just very good people. I think more important. No,
funny's more important there, let me rank it. Hold on
a second. Yeah, funny definitely more important than good, but
both important, super important.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
Yeah, but what's a part of you that you didn't
want them to inherit?
Speaker 1 (26:05):
My nose? I didn't want my daughter to have my beard,
for sure. My anxiety maybe, of course, you know, kids
they inherit that, whether you want them to or not.
But I think anxiety, yeah, And I think like growing
up without any money adds a measure of anxiety. But
(26:28):
then you realize, like, you know, my older kids, I
didn't have any money when they were growing up, and
now my younger kids I do. It's interesting because they
somehow managed to get to the anxiety like they find
different paths to it. It has nothing. It turns out
it doesn't like for me. Like when I was a
kid and I love to draw. I told you I
would get like a set of pens for Christmas, and
(26:50):
I would never want to use them because if I
use them, they'd run out. And so I'd have these
pens that I never used and eventually they just dry out.
Because we lived in Las Vegas, and what it's terrible thing.
So now you know what I do. I buy a
million art supplies and the house is like a dick blick.
(27:13):
You know that my house is just full of these
art supplies. And I know that I will never I
will not live long enough to use all this stuff,
but knowing it's there makes me feel like I've conquered
that anxiety in some way by hoarding. By hoarding, So.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
The reason why anyone else can't get art supplies is
Jimmy Kimmel, that's right, Yes, walk me through what anxiety
really feels like at this point now in your life.
How are your relationship with it's changed over that time,
from going from being anxious about not having money, no
having resources, not having a job, what does that look
like As the externals change, what happens on the inside.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Well, it's a lot simpler when you don't have any money,
because the things you're thinking about are, you know, do
I have enough cash in mycking account to have lunch
today to get a twenty dollars bill out? And like
it's like, oh, I have twenty one dollars and eighteen cents. Great,
you know, and that's significant certainly. But then you get
(28:14):
in a wind have been a position where a lot
of people rely on you for a lot of things,
and people will come to you with very serious needs,
serious requests. Your relationship with people changes. It's hard to
navigate that. It's hard to even find people to talk
about it with. There are, as far as I know,
(28:36):
no books on how to handle it. And you wind
up having these kind of like intimate conversations with famous
people you don't even really know that well. I mean, like,
I know a guy who is a real like family guy,
who's a very wealthy guy. He's a very famous actor.
And I said, how many houses have you bought for
(28:57):
your your family? And he thought about for a second
and he goes, seventeen. That was my reaction too, and
you can't be the nephew anymore. At that point. You're
the person that people go to when they need something,
and it can be a lot, you know, it really can.
I mean, I certainly I shouldn't complain. Now it sounds
(29:19):
like I'm complaining. Oh Jesus. We all have problems, right,
I mean some of them are just different than others.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Yeah, what do you do about that anxiety? What do
you do with it? Just buy more houses.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
For the most part. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it depends, you know,
But I'm hopefully getting better about it, you know, because
it's hard to explain to people when they want money,
but your relationship with them is more important than that money.
And then sometimes you realize like, oh wait, their relationship
with me is not more important than the money, and
(29:53):
that's when you have to reevaluate the relationship.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
That's tough. Yeah, it's hard, that's really really t uh.
I mean, yeah, is there someone particular or someone specific
that you think about when you when you share that.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
My wife, ha ha, she sucking me dry? Jaye? How
much do I get for this? Do I get paid?
Speaker 2 (30:14):
No?
Speaker 1 (30:15):
No?
Speaker 2 (30:15):
No, sh no, she made you do this for free?
Speaker 1 (30:18):
No, there's no one in particularly, just it comes up,
you know, it happens.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Yeah, in my small journey with it, I've definitely experienced
as well, losing people that you thought you were close to. Yeah,
realizing what standard or frequency of relationship you had with
someone and you put them up here and you thought
you had this bond and actually realized it was just
based on finances or access or whatever it may be.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
Yeah, you get an email from somebody you went to
the sixth grade with asking for a huge amount of
money for something nonsensical.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
It's not even for a charity, it's never it's crazy.
Any crazy requests you can share.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
Uh, you know, Yeah, we've had a lot of raising requests.
I mean, you know, people think you can wave a
magic wand and make all their problems go away, and
it's not true. You know, even if a lot of
times you give them what they want, they still have
to deal with whatever got them there in the first place. So,
you know, trying to keep that in mind I think
is important. But these are not the kinds of things
(31:20):
that occur to people when they were in a pinch.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
Yeah. Absolutely, You've been talking about your wife allow tonight
and how long have you been.
Speaker 1 (31:26):
Together now we are celebrating our twelfth anniversary in July.
We've been together I don't know, like sixteen years or
something like that.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
That's beautiful. And I believe you met on the show.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
I did, Yes, we met on the show. My wife
is the executive producer, one of the executive producers of
the show. And we made love. And I asked her.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
Say, it wasn't you and your guest it was.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
I got right to it. Yeah, no, she was not
a guest. Now, it wasn't like us.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Yeah, it wasn't like us, a bit different. This is terrible.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
This is uh, it's terrible that I'm very gentles.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
This is all my this is this is what my
British friends worry about LA being like this is this
is what they all worry about.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
You mean, all the friends who got buggered in boarding
school are worried about now.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
They're all like, what's what all the parties in LA like?
And you know, I'd be like, what's Jimmy Kimmel actually like?
And I'm gonna have to show them this.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
Yeah, let them know, invite them over.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
Above from the Franks. What have been the There's a
lot of people out here either looking for love who've
we're still searching And everyone always says it's always hard
to date in La. Yeah is that true?
Speaker 1 (32:46):
I think it is. I mean I've never really been
in that position. I've gone from one long term relationship
to another. But certainly people close to me and my
life of I've seen them have a really hard time
and even like think like, well maybe I should move
back to Chicago and that kind of thing, and I go, well,
wait a minute, but there's there's just the people here
(33:08):
and there whatever. And obviously the apps have changed that
a lot, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse,
I guess, depending on what your intentions are. But yeah,
sometimes I feel bad for people because it does seem
to be hard.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Yeah, what's been the secret for your connection? What's been
the secret source? That's sixteen years and the twelve years
of marriage.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Left to my own devices, I'm not great, okay, but
my wife is very good. She will say she wants
to I'm just checking in with you, and I'm like,
what is this checking in? She probably learned it from.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
You, just checking all right? Yeah, that sounds about right.
There's four check ins. There's one every week, one every month.
When every quarter and one every.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Year, and I get nervous. I'm like, well, what are
you checking in about? What am I a motel? It's like, no,
just how are you? How you doing? I'm like, Oh,
I'm fine? What did you hear? I don't know? I
have a very I have tunnel vision, you know, Like,
I got stuff I need to get done, and I
(34:16):
want to get it done, and sometimes I forget it.
There are other human beings around me that, you know,
would like to check in from time to time. So
I've learned a lot, and I'm still not great at it,
but I am better at it than I was. And
I feel like I've matured a lot thanks to my wife.
(34:37):
And in what way have I matured? Oh Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
You don't get away with saying I knew you would.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
Do this, Shay, I knew it. I knew coming in here.
What ways have I matured? Now? When we hold hands,
I don't take hers and put it behind me and
fart on it anymore. And that's a big step for me.
(35:08):
All right, Let me get serious here. It's hard. I
make jokes when I'm confronted with a serious situation. No,
don't ask her, I don't know if she wants to
be asked. Oh, she's standing, she wants to be asked. Huh,
all right, I need a mite, all right before she
(35:32):
gets up here, Jay, I should just say I haven't matured.
I was lying. I just wanted to sound I wanted
to fit in with the podcast. Oh this is what
it was. Yeah, right, I sit on my lap.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
Yeah, I'm not gonna sit on you. I'm not gonna
sit on your lap. He gets uncomfortable when we talk
about serious things. He's definitely maturing in that area.
Speaker 1 (36:01):
Well, I don't see any evidence of that.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
I'd like to say, first of all, I'm very proud
of you coming here and being here, because I think
that's mature of you. Jimmy is incredibly self deprecating if
you can't tell, and that's his defense, which is beautiful
and wonderful, and we all get to enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
But I get.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
To tell people how wonderful you are, and I love
to do that. And I think one of the things,
the most beautiful things you've done and evolving as a
human is sharing your story regularly on the show, fighting
for health care, for children, fighting for people.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
I think I.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
Think maybe you went from being a little more inward
to outward over the last decade of your life. I
think it's been beautiful to witness.
Speaker 1 (36:55):
Well, thank you for bringing it out of me.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
All right.
Speaker 3 (37:00):
You have a lot of more work to do though,
So Jimmy, Jimmy, now it's your time.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
We need uh, you know, turn this into a session. Yeah, okay,
now it's your time. Please.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Well, first of all, is it just me or does
it suddenly smell like toast?
Speaker 2 (37:15):
It does? You're having a stroke?
Speaker 1 (37:19):
He's having a stroke. Oh, wouldn't you love that? Well? Yeah,
you know, I'm always amazed at how easily these kind
words come out of my wife, and not just for me,
but for others like you. There's nobody you'd rather have
give a toast at your birthday dinner, because she really
(37:42):
speaks from the heart and speaks very beautifully and makes
people feel really good. And I don't think there's any
better quality than that.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Thank you. I love you, and I love you. I
love you too much. Thank you so much. We'll see
other night goes life to all right? Thank you, give
it up for everyone.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
Thank you. Oh you really put me on the spot there, Jay.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
Oh, she saved you. She saved me, He saved you.
I mean, you know, putty on the spot.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
But you're right.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Okay, So now we're going from couples therapy to individual therapy.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
Okay, great?
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Has talking about your emotion has always been something that
you found challenging not useful, Like we're on that spectrum.
Talk talk to me about that. What what spectrum is like?
What does that look like?
Speaker 1 (38:41):
Like? Well, I think my dad's the same way because
I hear my mother yelling at him about it. But yeah,
it's very you know, I can write a nice letter,
I'm good with that, but there's something about expressing myself
in a very honest way that it's difficult for me.
Why is it.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
The answers within the answers with this only you kids?
Speaker 1 (39:10):
A lot of stuff in there. I'm not sure I
want to go rummaging around you. There's a whole pizza
in there.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
But first, here's a quick word from the brands that
support the show. All right, thank you to our sponsors.
Now let's dive back in. When was the last time
you felt like you accessed that part without a letter
and you were able to share that part of you?
Speaker 1 (39:34):
About eighty six seconds ago, there were your emotions.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
Your emotions not about someone else, but how you feel about.
Speaker 1 (39:41):
Something about someone else. Well, no, no, not.
Speaker 2 (39:44):
How you feel about someone else, how you feel about
your own emotions or feeling an emotion that may be
uncomfortable or difficult or challenging. When was the last time
you feel? You did?
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Do that with our therapist last Friday? A. It's easier
with the therapist, you know. I was listening to you
with Bert Kreischer. Yeah, you had him on your podcast. Yeah,
and he said something. He said that after after he
(40:15):
and his wife go to therapy, he declares a winner.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Do you do this anything?
Speaker 1 (40:22):
No? But I like that a lot who wins, you know,
I don't think anybody wins. Really No, I think it's
just helpful. I think it's really a good thing. I
find it very uncomfortable, but I'm never I'm never not
glad that I did it afterwards. I think it's just
(40:42):
a good thing to talk. I mean, maybe it's the
reason why we can talk as humans, because we're supposed to.
And I think it's good. And I think a lot
of guys don't like to go to therapy, and then
they're looking for somebody who's going to be on there,
and they're looking for a referee more than a therapist,
(41:03):
and that's probably not the way to go in it.
I will say from my own personal experience that I
recommend it both individually and together. And I think that
it's helped me a lot in my life to sort
things out, you know, And I think what you do
is is, you know, is very helpful for people because
(41:27):
I mean, obviously, you know, there are a lot of
people here just trying to figure out who they are
and how to go about their lives and how to
be happy. And it's hard. It's hard to figure out
to be happy. I mean, there's no logical reason why
we should should be happy. It doesn't make sense. There
are so many people suffering, and there's so many sad
and bad things happening, and it feels selfish sometimes to
(41:51):
be happy. There's like, oh, yeah, great, things are going
great for you. But look what's you know, kids don't
have lunch, and I think that it takes a lot
to remember that that's not good for you and it's
not helping anybody. And if you really want to do something,
do something, don't just worry about it. And so that's
that's something that I think is important. And I also
(42:14):
found that, like you know, sometimes people want advice, and
sometimes I want advice, And sometimes people who are asking
you for advice don't really want to They don't want advice,
they just want something. And I always think that when
you're really down, when you're when you're feeling low, and
(42:36):
when you're looking for answers, helping other people is always
a help. It always makes you feel better. So if
there's a situation where you're feeling worthless, or you're you know,
you're feeling unloved or whatever, the best thing you can
do is to help someone else, because and for yourself,
(42:57):
not even for them. It's it's almost a selfish thing
to do, and I think it always works.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
I agree. I love that. I love that, Jimmy, You've
been amazing. Tonight. We end every on Purpose interview with
a final five. These questions have to be answered in
one word to one sentence maximum, So, Jimmy Kimmel, these
are your final five. The first question is what is
the best advice you've ever heard or received?
Speaker 1 (43:26):
Well, it's not be yourself. We learned that earlier. Listen, Listen,
that's the best advice.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
Who did you hear that from?
Speaker 1 (43:38):
I heard it from a priest, Yeah, a friend of
mine who's a priest. Yeah. I said, what do you
do when people come to you and they say, you know,
my son is dying and I don't believe in God?
He said, I just listened to them. Good advice speaking
about that.
Speaker 2 (43:55):
You've been very open about your son's heart condition, and
that's been some thing that I imagine is extremely difficult.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
Well not anymore because he's he's doing great, but it was,
yeah for sure.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
Yeah, Well what helped you at that time? What helps
you in such a difficult diet situation?
Speaker 1 (44:17):
And well, number one Children's hospital here in Los Angeles
help me. And the support, the support from family and strangers.
And I'm a religious person. I grew up going to church,
(44:42):
Catholic and all those things. But and I think that
the thoughts and prayers that gets thrown around a lot
people when they say they pray for you, that's to
take a moment of your day to stop and think
about out someone else and their child. It's a it's
(45:12):
a small sacrifice, but it's a meaningful one. Whether you
believe in prayer or not. It's I just think it's
powerful and meaningful. And I know that's more than one sentence,
but that's that's the answer.
Speaker 2 (45:29):
Thank you, June, thank you so much. That was actually
just question number one. I just I just snuck another
one in there. No question on the two, what is
the worst advice you ever had or receive?
Speaker 1 (45:44):
I you know, I don't really have an answer to that.
I think that the worst thing you can do, and
I've done it, and it's something that I've learned is
to is to lash out. You got to take a
beat and think about what you're saying, because you'll wish
(46:05):
you had.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:07):
So sometimes there are people that you know, just want
you to bring down the hammer of four and that's
not usually the way I go.
Speaker 2 (46:17):
I like that, all right. Question on the three, what's
the first thing you do in the morning and the
last thing you do at night?
Speaker 1 (46:22):
Oh? Brush my teeth? Well, you mean besides pe I guess, uh, yeah,
you know. We have you know, we have an eight
year old and a ten year old in the house.
So he comes in, our eight year old and pounces
on us in the morning and I'd just like to
snuggle with him, and then he wants us to come
(46:42):
to bed with him at night and put him asleep
every night. And we know that we shouldn't do it
every night, but we just want to. We want to
get in there with him, and most of the time
we're very easy to convince. So those are the you know,
the best in the morning with the kids in the bed,
and then again at night with the kids in the bed.
Speaker 2 (47:02):
That all right? Last two questions, Question umber four. What's
something that you used to value that you no longer value?
Speaker 1 (47:11):
My parents? No, I love my parents, you know what.
I don't drink much anymore. I used to. You know,
I was never I never like had a problem or
anything like that. But I've just it's less interesting to me. Now.
Speaker 2 (47:32):
Why Why is that?
Speaker 1 (47:33):
Because I'm so high all the time? We call that
California sober, I believe you.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
Yeah, all right. Fifth, fifth and final question. We asked
this to every guest who's ever been on the show.
If you could create one law that everyone in the
world had to follow, what would it be.
Speaker 1 (47:55):
It's the golden rule, do unto others. That's it. That's so,
that's the whole thing. Still, that's all you If we
all did that, we would we'd be doing great.
Speaker 2 (48:07):
Yeah, Jimmy, You've got one special segment to wrap it
up for you. Okay, I want to show you something
behind you. If you can get the first one up,
take a.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
Look, that's me.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
What what advice would you give to your youngest self,
to that self, that youngest self.
Speaker 1 (48:27):
To young Jimmy Kimmel in the seventh grade? Play the
saxophone instead of the clarinet. You're never getting late?
Speaker 2 (48:37):
I love it. Can we get a second up? Looking
very daffa? What does what does Jimmy Kimmel need to hear?
Right now?
Speaker 1 (48:47):
Get away from that young boy? You mean me right,
both of you, and.
Speaker 2 (48:59):
Then let's get the one courtesy of my You.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
Know, honestly, I never even thought i'd own a suit,
so I'm ahead of the game right now. I think, Oh,
was that Ai Me in the future?
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Uh? Why is my beard the same color as it
is now?
Speaker 2 (49:17):
You're agent? Well, you're aging? Well, what do you hope
you'll feel about yourself at that age?
Speaker 1 (49:25):
I hope I don't look like that number one. I
do hope I have that much hair. I have a
feeling I am going to be replaced by an Ai
me at some point in the future. I hope I
wind up like my grandfather. And by that I don't
mean dead. I mean it's just somebody that everybody thinks
of and loves.
Speaker 2 (49:45):
Give it up for Jimmy, give everyone. Yes, Thank you
so much, Thanks Shay. If you love this episode, I
need you to listen to one of my favorite conversations ever.
It's with the one and only Tom Holland on how
to overcome your social anxiety, especially in situations where you're
not drinking and everyone else is. We talk about his
(50:08):
sobriety journey and so much more. He gets really personal.
I can't wait for you to hear it. It's gonna
blow your mind. The quote is, if you have a
problem with me, text me.
Speaker 1 (50:17):
And if you don't have my number, you don't know
me well enough to have a problem with me.
It feels selfish sometimes to be happy. It's hard to
figure out to be happy. There's no logical reason why
we should be happy. It doesn't make sense. Jimmy Chevill's
been hosting his late night show for over twenty years.
Speaker 2 (00:15):
Jimmy, you don't do a lot of interviews. What does
it feel like to be on the other side?
Speaker 1 (00:18):
Putting yourself out there is hard? I started in radio.
You're already halfway hidden and nobody sees you. You don't
have an audience there to not laugh if you're not funny.
Speaker 2 (00:29):
When everyone's firing you, letting go of you, telling you
this isn't a great idea. How do you hold on
to an idea when everyone's telling you it's terrible?
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Pure delusion?
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Has Talking about your emotion has always been something that
you found challenging.
Speaker 1 (00:43):
And I feel like I've matured a lot thanks to
my wife.
Speaker 2 (00:47):
In what way?
Speaker 1 (00:48):
No, don't ask her, Oh she's standing, she wants to
be asked? Oh, all right? Before she gets up here, Jay,
I should just say.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
You've been very open about your son's heart condition, and
that's been something that I imagine is extremely difficult.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
To stop and think about someone else and their child
the number one Health and Well in his podcast Jay
Setty Jay Shetty Jet.
Speaker 2 (01:22):
All right, I'm so excited to be here tonight at
the Greek in LA with the One and Onney, Jimmy Gimble.
Make some noise everyone, Thank you.
Speaker 1 (01:31):
Thank you for having me. Jay. I want you to
know that my first question, as it always is, because
I'm never I'm interested. I was watching you and when
you have people stand up, and you said, stand up
if you've ever worried about how you looked, and I
was thinking, I was wondering because I couldn't see the
audience if anyone didn't stand, because I think everybody and
if there was a person who's never worried about how
(01:53):
they looked, that's the person I want to hang out
with after the show. But I said, what is the dress?
You know what is the because you know I want
to fit in. They said it's elevated casual. I was like,
all right, well, okay, I'll find something that seems to
fit that category. And then I come here and you
are just like Adam Sandler.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
I'm not wearing shorts. It's just not wearing shorts.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Is technically elevate And what is it elevate from I
don't know what this is, but I assume what you
want to go to seven eleven. There's nothing. This is
just casual.
Speaker 2 (02:28):
This is not this is interesting level.
Speaker 1 (02:31):
Casual is what it is.
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Jimmy, this is not the roast of.
Speaker 1 (02:36):
I was told differently.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
I think you're at the wrong event. I think we're
gonna see you stand up.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
If you've ever eaten a whole pizza by yourself.
Speaker 2 (02:50):
Jimmy, with three minutes in and you started roasting me already,
I'm sorry, it's my nature.
Speaker 1 (02:55):
I was telling you. I was why it was confusing
to me, because you're talking to these people, and everybody's
got these great stories, and you're hypnotizing them with your eyes.
I know what you do. You know, like eighty five
percent of this audience is here in the hope they
might get to have sex with you, right, That's why
I showed up.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
So how does this go, Jimmy? How does that work
between me and you? What sex? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (03:28):
Well, when a host and his guests fall very much
in love, they go into the dressing room and I'll
show you from there.
Speaker 2 (03:41):
Yes, that's right. My wife would not approve. Thank you
so much. That's the only reason. Thank you so much.
I appreciate, Jimmy. You don't do a lot of interviews,
but you.
Speaker 1 (03:50):
No one wants to talk to me.
Speaker 2 (03:53):
You agreed to do this one? Why now?
Speaker 1 (03:56):
Why here?
Speaker 2 (03:57):
And what does it feel like to be on the
other side.
Speaker 1 (04:00):
First of all, my wife loves you, and so I've
become exposed to you your magic. We have some mutual friends,
and really, I said to my wife, I said, hey,
Jay Shetty asked me if I would do his show.
I said, what do you think? She said, well, I'd
like to hear you on that and I said, all right,
well you're not listening to me at home, so maybe
(04:23):
maybe we can accomplish something.
Speaker 2 (04:24):
Well, it makes the magic happen. Where is she?
Speaker 1 (04:26):
I he is here, but I don't know where she's sitting.
She may be If you guys, this happened right on
a card? What do you think of her? We'll hand
them to her.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
Thank you for making this happened, Jimmy. Let's start there. Actually,
you know, tonight has been all about what we don't
do because of what people think of us. The things
we worry that people are perceiving about us, the judgments,
the criticisms, that people have of us. Talk to me
about the time in your life when you really felt
like prison by that.
Speaker 1 (05:00):
If ever, oh, very much so all the time, not
just I mean really honestly, Like if I'm at an
event and I'm not dressed properly, I feel In fact,
I went to a wedding recently. A very good friend
invited me to be in his wedding party, and he
was not great with the details of the party. But
again another dress code situation. This one was festive attire,
(05:24):
which means nothing to me. And I was in the
wedding party and I wore what I thought was festive attire,
and I showed up and everyone else was in a
black suit, and so I'm the idiot in all these
wedding photos and that, you know, that's I feel uncomfortable
with the simple things like that. But I you know,
putting yourself out there is hard. And I'm not talking
(05:47):
about show business necessarily. I think that there are a
lot of people that I've known over years and years
who are really good at something, and you tried your
best to encourage them to do that thing that they're
good at, and they're either going to do it or
they aren't. And sometimes for them, you saying they're good
at it is enough. That's enough for them, and they
(06:11):
don't want to threaten that idea. They don't want you
to ever think, oh, you weren't good at that, so
they leave it. And I think that's to me, that's
so sad that people will do that, because I do
think that there are so many people who know they
have this potential or this talent or whatever it is,
and they just they don't use it because they don't
(06:34):
want to be proven otherwise because everyone in their little
circle thinks it and they don't want to change their minds.
And I know that's an inelegant way of saying it,
but you just really need to do it. You have
to do it. And I for me, I was fortunate
because I started in radio, and when you're on the radio,
you're already halfway hidden and nobody sees you. You don't
(06:58):
have an audience there to not laugh if you're not funny,
so you just kind of have to assume you were
and you keep going. And I was able to take
baby steps from being on the radio to being the
sidekick on a game show to being a partner on
a comedy show to eventually doing my own show, and
(07:19):
I'm not sure if I would have been able to
take that big leap. I was fortunate, really genuinely fortunate
and very lucky to have been in a situation where
I could take those steps one by one. Oh yeah,
I mean it's just a lot of it is luck.
You know. That's the other thing that is a sad truth.
But a lot of it is luck. Now you have
(07:41):
to be ready when you get that moment where you
are lucky, when you have that moment of fortune, you
have to be prepared and you have to do whatever
it is that you need to do to accomplish whatever
goal you would like to accomplish. But still, luck is
a big part of it.
Speaker 2 (07:58):
Yeah, I want to get to that, but I want
to I want to go backwards a little bit because
I read somewhere that you actually grew up wanting to
be a scientist.
Speaker 1 (08:05):
No, no, I don't know where you read that, But
that is false.
Speaker 2 (08:10):
Okay.
Speaker 1 (08:11):
Was I farting into ziploc bags and leaving them under
my sister's pillow? Yes, if that, if that's what you
consider to be science, I wanted to be a scientist,
but no, science was never my thing. I wanted to
be an artist. When I was a kid, I like
to draw. That was my thing. I wanted to drawing. Yes,
I would you draw. I draw my classmates, which they
(08:35):
never liked. I would draw anything, superheroes when I was
a little kid, caricatures of people. I'd draw my family.
I draw David Letterman on the television as I was
watching him. Pretty much. I still to this day if
i'm if I have a pen and a piece of paper,
I'll just scribble whatever whoever is sitting in front of
(08:57):
me as we're sitting there.
Speaker 2 (08:58):
Wow. And so you still do it today?
Speaker 1 (09:00):
I do?
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Have you done it on the show?
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Ever? A couple of times? It's hard to be funny
and draw at the same time. They're like, they're totally
different parts of your brain. They definitely got that wrong.
The media never gets anything wrong, right, So yeah, this
scientist in this case, it's your fault in this case.
Speaker 2 (09:18):
I'm always fascinated by what people wanted to be when
they were growing up and then what they end up becoming,
because I think there's so much hidden in childhood and
there's so many experiences, so many things we hear say
the subjects we study at school. But you've had this
history of pranks always being a central pillar, and for
most of us, maybe you did a few pranks when
(09:39):
you were a kid. How many of you did some
pranks when you were kids? Are your pranks? Yeah, all right,
a few of you. I did a lot of pranks
when I was kids, but sometimes you leave those behind.
But you actually lost jobs because you did pranks on
your colleagues, Yeah, yeah, bosses.
Speaker 1 (09:55):
Right, all right, it's just going to be where I
crack open this June and there's a cocker roach in
it or something like that because you plaunted it. Because
this is sabotage, there's a prank. Yeah, I love pranks.
I think the reason that I love pranks is because
I grew up in a family that would scream and
yell when I did something, and I got a great
reaction out of it. I mean, really, if you don't
(10:16):
want to be pranked, just don't react. That's the way
to go. But I grew up. My aunt Chippy is
a very loud woman. She is on my show regularly.
We are still she's eighty five years old. Most recently,
I started by putting little explosive in her cigarettes. And
tying cans to the back of her car, and she
(10:36):
would go to work, or she'd be in the casino
in Las Vegas smoking and pow the cigarette would blow up,
and then she'd call and curse me out over the phone.
And I loved it. And now that I have a
TV show, I'm able to escalate. So a couple of
months ago, this has been a dream of mine since
I saw those Waymo cars. She doesn't know about these
(11:00):
lives in Las Vegas, and she's never seen a self
driving car. So I had a guy pretend to be
a chauffeur in a Waymo car pick her up at
the airport. He gets out of the car, he opens
the door for her. He says, I have to you
might have to use the restroom and then we'll go.
She's like, yeah, no problem, go ahead. He closes the
door of the car and off it goes. And there
(11:27):
was some real concern that this might kill her because
she's eighty five. So I wrote to each of her daughters,
my three cousins. I said, listen, here's the one I'm
planning to do your mother, and I need your permission
beforehand because I don't want to kill her. On TV
and if I do I need someone to blame. Within seconds,
(11:47):
they all said, oh, definitely do it. Definitely do it.
So we've got a sick family, but a fun family.
Speaker 2 (11:56):
But talk to me about when you won't you didn't
have the reason is to put it off your own
show and you were losing jobs of a pranking your bosses. Yeah,
first of all, where does the audacity come from? And
second of how do you keep doing it? I believe
it wasn't just once.
Speaker 1 (12:11):
I wouldn't call it audacity so much as I would
call it stupidity. I thought that I was a dish jockey.
I did a morning radio show, and I worked at
a lot of radio stations in a lot of cities.
If you've lived in the city, I've probably had a
job and been fired in that city. And each time
(12:31):
I thought the bosses would be on board with the
idea that the listeners would think it was funny if
I was torturing them, because then they could drive their
work and go I love hearing this. These guys screw
at their bosses. I wish I could do that, but
I'm enjoying it through them, and they never liked it
at all. They would tell me they were gonna like
(12:52):
it when they hired me, and then when it happened,
they hated it. Just dumb stuff. Once we were golfing
and I latched their golf bags on the back of
the carts and then forgot about it for like six
holes and then ran over their golf clubs. Once I
completely smashed the inside of a hot dog. It's a
(13:15):
long story, but there was a hot dog that he
didn't eat, and he threw in the garbage, and every
night I would sneak in and put it in his
drawer in his desk. And each day he'd open his
desk and there'd be a hot dog in there, and
he didn't know why, and he'd throw in the garbage again.
And then each time I would get in there and
I'd put it back in the desk. And then he
(13:38):
started locking his office. And so I climbed in over
the you know the offices have that like kind of
really cheap ceiling. I lowered myself in, and as I
lowered myself completely, the desk collapsed, the shelves collapsed. It
(13:58):
looked like the North rich earthquake had happen only in
his office. I knew that I'd be fired if he
found out. So I just got out of there and
locked the door, put the hot dog in before I left,
and never mentioned it again. I don't know what he
thought happened, but eventually they'd fire me. Eventually they'd have
(14:20):
enough of mine.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Now, how did that conversation go the firing? Was there
a conversation or you just go to messes like it would.
Speaker 1 (14:25):
Go like this? Yeah, of course there were different situations,
but generally it would go so, you know how you
work here, Now tomorrow you won't be working here. And
in fact, we're gonna get a box, we're gonna go
in your office, or we're gonna get all your shit
and we're gonna walk you out to the parking lot.
I have to say to this day, I hate firing people.
(14:49):
It crushes me to fire somebody, even if they deserve it,
even if they've done something bad, because I've been fired
so many times and it sounds funny. These stories are
I know, I get that they're funny, but it wasn't
funny at all at the time. You know, I was
making like eighteen thousand dollars a year and then had
to go home and first of all, tell my wife
at the time that I'd been fired again for being
(15:12):
an idiot, and that we're gonna have to pack all
our stuff and move to Tucson. And that happened over
and over and over again, until eventually I found a
radio station here in La k Rock that valued my
commitment to nonsense. And I also grew up a little
(15:32):
and I learned like, Okay, don't call your boss's wife
at home on the air and dig into their personal life.
Those kind of lessons, those important lessons that you learn
along the way. And I was able to keep that
job until I got a job in television.
Speaker 2 (15:48):
I love your commitment to the prank.
Speaker 1 (15:51):
I have love things going on right now that would
blow your mind that I can't even talk about because
they're bubbling. But what my thing is my wife does
not like. When I my wife, I got her a
Did you know you can get a personalized license plate
for anyone's car?
Speaker 2 (16:07):
No, How does that explain that to me?
Speaker 1 (16:10):
Well, what you do is you fill out the forms
and then you forge the person's signature at the bottom,
and you right on the thing what you would like
their personalized license plate to be. In my wife's case,
I made it we be jamming, and then the license
plate came in the mail and I went out in
(16:32):
the garage and I screwed it onto the car and
I waited until she was you know, until she came
out to the car, and she wasn't happy. But I've
done that with a lot of people. My band leader,
who plays the saxophone, I made one that says send
youor saxy and I put that on his car. I
got the idea to you two concert. Somebody had a
(16:53):
license plate said you two fan. I thought, oh, okay,
maybe I'll do that in a bad way.
Speaker 2 (17:02):
What's a firing conversation that went wrong? What's the worst
time you've fired someone and you're like, oh, I shouldn't
have done it like that.
Speaker 1 (17:08):
Oh well, one time it went on for like three
and a half hours. It was me because of me
and them crying and just kind of going around in
circles over and over again, and until finally I was like,
all right, I gotta go pick up my kids.
Speaker 2 (17:24):
That's the way you fired them. Then hugged them.
Speaker 1 (17:26):
Oh yeah, right, yeah, there's always some hugging involved. Yeah,
it's you know, it's not great. I got fired one
time and i'd been fired now so many times I
knew what was I knew was coming because the way,
do you know, is they stop yelling at you. And
once they stopped yelling at you, you're in trouble. They're like,
I forget and we don't why bother We're firing them
(17:48):
in three weeks. But I went in and it was
me and my partner on the radio, and they sat
us down. They said, listen, you know, we're going to
go in a different direction, and you know all that
bullshit that they say to you and probably best for
you guys too, And I'm thinking, no, it's not. And
then they gave the whole spiel and they were nervous,
and I said, listen, here's what we're going to do.
(18:09):
We're going to come to work on Monday morning and
we're going to pretend like none of this ever happened.
And there was a long moment of confused and terrified silence,
and then I started laughing and gave him the finger
and left.
Speaker 2 (18:28):
I think, before we dive into the next moment, let's
hear from our sponsors and back to our episode. On
a serious note, what's beautiful about that is you were
able to hold on to a really authentic part of
self expression. That was your comedy. It was something you
found funny. It was something that you really believed it
was something everyone would find funny. You didn't give up
(18:50):
on that. You were able to hold on to it
and find a place eventually that allows you to pull
off these crazy things. How did you stay true to
that when everyone's firing you, letting go of you, telling
you this isn't a great idea, it's pushing people the
wrong way. Like, how do you hold on to an
idea when everyone's telling you it's terrible.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Pure delusion? Just like a lot of the things I
thought were so funny weren't even funny, Like they weren't funny, Like,
you know, I wasn't that good at my job. And
I think that's an important thing too, because I look
back at these jobs and I go, well, it wasn't
all their fault, you know. Like on one hand, I
feel like maybe they should have recognized that I was
always a very hard worker and that I did have
(19:27):
some talent. I think every one of them would tell
you that. But on the other hand, like I was
kind of crazy, you know, I was doing anti social things,
and they didn't get it, and they didn't want to
deal with it. They were adults, and I was this asshole,
you know, this kid, and they didn't want to deal
with it. But I do have this thing where I
just kind of figure like, well, if I think it's funny,
(19:47):
then surely there will be other people that think it's funny.
And it applies to other people too. You know. One
of the best things about my job, and really about
even when I was on the radio, is I've been
able to identify and help other people who I saw
as talented and who didn't quite know how to do
it or make their way in or stay there once
(20:08):
they got in, And that to me is very sad.
Even just putting my aunt Chippy on television right now,
I'm not the first person to put one of their
relatives on television, but I just kind of looked around
and go like, well, I think she's funny, and so
I think other people will think she's funny. And the
same with my uncle Frank, her ex husband, who was
(20:31):
on my security guard on the show before Giermo was there,
and then they were there at the same time. He
was just this weird, very neurotic, very anxious former cop
from New York who only arrested six people in twenty
years and had this strange outlook on life where he
(20:52):
would take two hundred dollars out of his atm at
the beginning of the week and then he wanted to
have zero dollars in his wall at the end of
the week and it had to be that way, and
so if he had any money left in his wallet
on Sunday, he'd just give it to people, like strangers.
He just handed out to people. And he was always
doing this like weird stuff. And I, you know, at
(21:13):
one time, my band leader on my show is my
best friend since I was nine years old. We grew
up across the street from each other, and I didn't
know my relatives were funny until he thought they were funny.
I was like, Oh, they're annoying. They're always yelling at
each other. They're you know, so like, oh, they're coming over.
He's I said, my Aunt Chippy and Uncle Frank are
coming over. He's like, oh, can I come. I was
(21:34):
like what. He's like, Oh, they're hilarious. I was like
they are and that clicked for me. I was like, oh, yeah,
they are hilarious, and it turned out he was right,
and I've just kind of operated by that principle for
my whole life.
Speaker 2 (21:48):
Yeah, talking about family, it just became a granddad too,
right I did.
Speaker 1 (21:51):
My daughter Katie had a baby, a baby girl. Probably
should have got more applause for that, but thank you.
I feel like almost killing my aunt Chippy got more
applause than having a granddaughter. But yeah, we're very excited.
(22:13):
She's what like maybe like eight days old or something. Yeah, yes,
smoking already, which we're we're concerned about.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
But how does that feel way? What is that like psychologically? Internally? Mentally?
Speaker 1 (22:27):
I feel like I don't know. People seem to think like,
first of all, people approach you cautiously in a way
about it, like, oh, so you're having like like I'm
gonna be upset about this? What kind of an asshole
would be upset about having her grandchild? But I guess
people don't want to be thought of as old, and
I don't really care that much about that. I'm just
(22:48):
excited to have a little and also being a grandparent.
I think it's gonna be, first of all, an incredible
way to get revenge on my children.
Speaker 2 (22:59):
Tell me, how, uh, what are the pranks that are bringing.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Not even pranks, just all the things they did to
me that they're gonna say. I know they're gonna go,
don't give please put them to bed before eleven o'clock,
you know, don't give them a bunch of Reese's pieces.
And I'm gonna nod, just like my parents do. And
then I'm gonna do all the shit they don't want
me to do. And I think that's one of the
(23:23):
grands where the circle of life, you know. But it's
fun and it's exciting, and it's strange to see my
daughter as a mom. I think that for me is
is that it's not really about how I feel, because
I've always felt like the same person. I feel like
I'm the same person I was when I was nine
years old. But to see like your daughter holding a
baby and smiling is it's, yeah, people know, it's great.
Speaker 2 (23:47):
Yeah, absolutely give it up. It's it's beautiful to hear
about that, because yeah, it's uh, I've I have no experience.
Speaker 1 (23:57):
You have no grandchildren.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
I have kids, no grandkids, And it's really fascinating watching
someone you love grow into becoming someone else. Like you said,
it was strange watching her do it what are you
noticing in her that's that feels that way.
Speaker 1 (24:11):
Well, she's breastfeeding, which she'd never done before. You know,
she's just seeing My daughter is very funny. All my
kids are really funny. My daughter, Katie is very funny.
She's got a very strange sense of humor. She's an artist.
She makes these funny ceramics. Her name is Katie Kimmel.
(24:32):
You could see her on Instagram and she you will
get you will understand what I'm talking about. She does
like today she sent me like I sent her a
text this morning and I said, you're not posting enough
pictures of the baby on the stream, And so she
just posted a bunch of pictures of the baby screaming
and crying, and the baby's wearing a onesie that says
(24:53):
I'm eleven years old. So I know she's gotta you know,
she's not going to be a traditional mom, but just
seeing or be a mom is is Uh, it's just funny.
It's it's I think it's like anything like when I
try to remember how old I am, I don't know
if you ever forget how old you are? Yeah, I
(25:14):
have to remember how old My sister is an ad
three years. That's how I get to it. And just
seeing my kids become adults and my both of my
older kids are married, and like having to pay rent
and to and be a husband and a wife is weird.
(25:34):
It's just weird. You know, it's great, but it's weird.
Speaker 2 (25:38):
Yeah, they obviously inherited your comedic gene. It sounds like, yeah,
I know, I don't.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
I wouldn't necessarily classified as genius. But they are very
funny and they're just very good people. I think more important. No,
funny's more important there, let me rank it. Hold on
a second. Yeah, funny definitely more important than good, but
both important, super important.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
Yeah, but what's a part of you that you didn't
want them to inherit?
Speaker 1 (26:05):
My nose? I didn't want my daughter to have my beard,
for sure. My anxiety maybe, of course, you know, kids
they inherit that, whether you want them to or not.
But I think anxiety, yeah, And I think like growing
up without any money adds a measure of anxiety. But
(26:28):
then you realize, like, you know, my older kids, I
didn't have any money when they were growing up, and
now my younger kids I do. It's interesting because they
somehow managed to get to the anxiety like they find
different paths to it. It has nothing. It turns out
it doesn't like for me. Like when I was a
kid and I love to draw. I told you I
would get like a set of pens for Christmas, and
(26:50):
I would never want to use them because if I
use them, they'd run out. And so I'd have these
pens that I never used and eventually they just dry out.
Because we lived in Las Vegas, and what it's terrible thing.
So now you know what I do. I buy a
million art supplies and the house is like a dick blick.
(27:13):
You know that my house is just full of these
art supplies. And I know that I will never I
will not live long enough to use all this stuff,
but knowing it's there makes me feel like I've conquered
that anxiety in some way by hoarding. By hoarding, So.
Speaker 2 (27:30):
The reason why anyone else can't get art supplies is
Jimmy Kimmel, that's right, Yes, walk me through what anxiety
really feels like at this point now in your life.
How are your relationship with it's changed over that time,
from going from being anxious about not having money, no
having resources, not having a job, what does that look
like As the externals change, what happens on the inside.
Speaker 1 (27:52):
Well, it's a lot simpler when you don't have any money,
because the things you're thinking about are, you know, do
I have enough cash in mycking account to have lunch
today to get a twenty dollars bill out? And like
it's like, oh, I have twenty one dollars and eighteen cents. Great,
you know, and that's significant certainly. But then you get
(28:14):
in a wind have been a position where a lot
of people rely on you for a lot of things,
and people will come to you with very serious needs,
serious requests. Your relationship with people changes. It's hard to
navigate that. It's hard to even find people to talk
about it with. There are, as far as I know,
(28:36):
no books on how to handle it. And you wind
up having these kind of like intimate conversations with famous
people you don't even really know that well. I mean, like,
I know a guy who is a real like family guy,
who's a very wealthy guy. He's a very famous actor.
And I said, how many houses have you bought for
(28:57):
your your family? And he thought about for a second
and he goes, seventeen. That was my reaction too, and
you can't be the nephew anymore. At that point. You're
the person that people go to when they need something,
and it can be a lot, you know, it really can.
I mean, I certainly I shouldn't complain. Now it sounds
(29:19):
like I'm complaining. Oh Jesus. We all have problems, right,
I mean some of them are just different than others.
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Yeah, what do you do about that anxiety? What do
you do with it? Just buy more houses.
Speaker 1 (29:32):
For the most part. Yeah, yeah, yeah, it depends, you know,
But I'm hopefully getting better about it, you know, because
it's hard to explain to people when they want money,
but your relationship with them is more important than that money.
And then sometimes you realize like, oh wait, their relationship
with me is not more important than the money, and
(29:53):
that's when you have to reevaluate the relationship.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
That's tough. Yeah, it's hard, that's really really t uh.
I mean, yeah, is there someone particular or someone specific
that you think about when you when you share that.
Speaker 1 (30:06):
My wife, ha ha, she sucking me dry? Jaye? How
much do I get for this? Do I get paid?
Speaker 2 (30:14):
No?
Speaker 1 (30:15):
No?
Speaker 2 (30:15):
No, sh no, she made you do this for free?
Speaker 1 (30:18):
No, there's no one in particularly, just it comes up,
you know, it happens.
Speaker 2 (30:22):
Yeah, in my small journey with it, I've definitely experienced
as well, losing people that you thought you were close to. Yeah,
realizing what standard or frequency of relationship you had with
someone and you put them up here and you thought
you had this bond and actually realized it was just
based on finances or access or whatever it may be.
Speaker 1 (30:42):
Yeah, you get an email from somebody you went to
the sixth grade with asking for a huge amount of
money for something nonsensical.
Speaker 2 (30:52):
It's not even for a charity, it's never it's crazy.
Any crazy requests you can share.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
Uh, you know, Yeah, we've had a lot of raising requests.
I mean, you know, people think you can wave a
magic wand and make all their problems go away, and
it's not true. You know, even if a lot of
times you give them what they want, they still have
to deal with whatever got them there in the first place. So,
you know, trying to keep that in mind I think
is important. But these are not the kinds of things
(31:20):
that occur to people when they were in a pinch.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
Yeah. Absolutely, You've been talking about your wife allow tonight
and how long have you been.
Speaker 1 (31:26):
Together now we are celebrating our twelfth anniversary in July.
We've been together I don't know, like sixteen years or
something like that.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
That's beautiful. And I believe you met on the show.
Speaker 1 (31:41):
I did, Yes, we met on the show. My wife
is the executive producer, one of the executive producers of
the show. And we made love. And I asked her.
Speaker 2 (31:52):
Say, it wasn't you and your guest it was.
Speaker 1 (31:54):
I got right to it. Yeah, no, she was not
a guest. Now, it wasn't like us.
Speaker 2 (32:00):
Yeah, it wasn't like us, a bit different. This is terrible.
Speaker 1 (32:05):
This is uh, it's terrible that I'm very gentles.
Speaker 2 (32:09):
This is all my this is this is what my
British friends worry about LA being like this is this
is what they all worry about.
Speaker 1 (32:17):
You mean, all the friends who got buggered in boarding
school are worried about now.
Speaker 2 (32:23):
They're all like, what's what all the parties in LA like?
And you know, I'd be like, what's Jimmy Kimmel actually like?
And I'm gonna have to show them this.
Speaker 1 (32:30):
Yeah, let them know, invite them over.
Speaker 2 (32:33):
Above from the Franks. What have been the There's a
lot of people out here either looking for love who've
we're still searching And everyone always says it's always hard
to date in La. Yeah is that true?
Speaker 1 (32:46):
I think it is. I mean I've never really been
in that position. I've gone from one long term relationship
to another. But certainly people close to me and my
life of I've seen them have a really hard time
and even like think like, well maybe I should move
back to Chicago and that kind of thing, and I go, well,
wait a minute, but there's there's just the people here
(33:08):
and there whatever. And obviously the apps have changed that
a lot, sometimes for the better, sometimes for the worse,
I guess, depending on what your intentions are. But yeah,
sometimes I feel bad for people because it does seem
to be hard.
Speaker 2 (33:23):
Yeah, what's been the secret for your connection? What's been
the secret source? That's sixteen years and the twelve years
of marriage.
Speaker 1 (33:30):
Left to my own devices, I'm not great, okay, but
my wife is very good. She will say she wants
to I'm just checking in with you, and I'm like,
what is this checking in? She probably learned it from.
Speaker 2 (33:42):
You, just checking all right? Yeah, that sounds about right.
There's four check ins. There's one every week, one every month.
When every quarter and one every.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Year, and I get nervous. I'm like, well, what are
you checking in about? What am I a motel? It's like, no,
just how are you? How you doing? I'm like, Oh,
I'm fine? What did you hear? I don't know? I
have a very I have tunnel vision, you know, Like,
I got stuff I need to get done, and I
(34:16):
want to get it done, and sometimes I forget it.
There are other human beings around me that, you know,
would like to check in from time to time. So
I've learned a lot, and I'm still not great at it,
but I am better at it than I was. And
I feel like I've matured a lot thanks to my wife.
(34:37):
And in what way have I matured? Oh Jesus Christ.
Speaker 2 (34:43):
You don't get away with saying I knew you would.
Speaker 1 (34:45):
Do this, Shay, I knew it. I knew coming in here.
What ways have I matured? Now? When we hold hands,
I don't take hers and put it behind me and
fart on it anymore. And that's a big step for me.
(35:08):
All right, Let me get serious here. It's hard. I
make jokes when I'm confronted with a serious situation. No,
don't ask her, I don't know if she wants to
be asked. Oh, she's standing, she wants to be asked. Huh,
all right, I need a mite, all right before she
(35:32):
gets up here, Jay, I should just say I haven't matured.
I was lying. I just wanted to sound I wanted
to fit in with the podcast. Oh this is what
it was. Yeah, right, I sit on my lap.
Speaker 3 (35:50):
Yeah, I'm not gonna sit on you. I'm not gonna
sit on your lap. He gets uncomfortable when we talk
about serious things. He's definitely maturing in that area.
Speaker 1 (36:01):
Well, I don't see any evidence of that.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
I'd like to say, first of all, I'm very proud
of you coming here and being here, because I think
that's mature of you. Jimmy is incredibly self deprecating if
you can't tell, and that's his defense, which is beautiful
and wonderful, and we all get to enjoy it.
Speaker 2 (36:22):
But I get.
Speaker 3 (36:22):
To tell people how wonderful you are, and I love
to do that. And I think one of the things,
the most beautiful things you've done and evolving as a
human is sharing your story regularly on the show, fighting
for health care, for children, fighting for people.
Speaker 1 (36:44):
I think I.
Speaker 3 (36:45):
Think maybe you went from being a little more inward
to outward over the last decade of your life. I
think it's been beautiful to witness.
Speaker 1 (36:55):
Well, thank you for bringing it out of me.
Speaker 2 (36:57):
You're welcome.
Speaker 1 (36:59):
Thank you.
Speaker 2 (36:59):
All right.
Speaker 3 (37:00):
You have a lot of more work to do though,
So Jimmy, Jimmy, now it's your time.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
We need uh, you know, turn this into a session. Yeah, okay,
now it's your time. Please.
Speaker 1 (37:11):
Well, first of all, is it just me or does
it suddenly smell like toast?
Speaker 2 (37:15):
It does? You're having a stroke?
Speaker 1 (37:19):
He's having a stroke. Oh, wouldn't you love that? Well? Yeah,
you know, I'm always amazed at how easily these kind
words come out of my wife, and not just for me,
but for others like you. There's nobody you'd rather have
give a toast at your birthday dinner, because she really
(37:42):
speaks from the heart and speaks very beautifully and makes
people feel really good. And I don't think there's any
better quality than that.
Speaker 2 (37:51):
Thank you. I love you, and I love you. I
love you too much. Thank you so much. We'll see
other night goes life to all right? Thank you, give
it up for everyone.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
Thank you. Oh you really put me on the spot there, Jay.
Speaker 2 (38:18):
Oh, she saved you. She saved me, He saved you.
I mean, you know, putty on the spot.
Speaker 1 (38:22):
But you're right.
Speaker 2 (38:23):
Okay, So now we're going from couples therapy to individual therapy.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
Okay, great?
Speaker 2 (38:28):
Has talking about your emotion has always been something that
you found challenging not useful, Like we're on that spectrum.
Talk talk to me about that. What what spectrum is like?
What does that look like?
Speaker 1 (38:41):
Like? Well, I think my dad's the same way because
I hear my mother yelling at him about it. But yeah,
it's very you know, I can write a nice letter,
I'm good with that, but there's something about expressing myself
in a very honest way that it's difficult for me.
Why is it.
Speaker 2 (39:05):
The answers within the answers with this only you kids?
Speaker 1 (39:10):
A lot of stuff in there. I'm not sure I
want to go rummaging around you. There's a whole pizza
in there.
Speaker 2 (39:19):
But first, here's a quick word from the brands that
support the show. All right, thank you to our sponsors.
Now let's dive back in. When was the last time
you felt like you accessed that part without a letter
and you were able to share that part of you?
Speaker 1 (39:34):
About eighty six seconds ago, there were your emotions.
Speaker 2 (39:38):
Your emotions not about someone else, but how you feel about.
Speaker 1 (39:41):
Something about someone else. Well, no, no, not.
Speaker 2 (39:44):
How you feel about someone else, how you feel about
your own emotions or feeling an emotion that may be
uncomfortable or difficult or challenging. When was the last time
you feel? You did?
Speaker 1 (39:54):
Do that with our therapist last Friday? A. It's easier
with the therapist, you know. I was listening to you
with Bert Kreischer. Yeah, you had him on your podcast. Yeah,
and he said something. He said that after after he
(40:15):
and his wife go to therapy, he declares a winner.
Speaker 2 (40:21):
Do you do this anything?
Speaker 1 (40:22):
No? But I like that a lot who wins, you know,
I don't think anybody wins. Really No, I think it's
just helpful. I think it's really a good thing. I
find it very uncomfortable, but I'm never I'm never not
glad that I did it afterwards. I think it's just
(40:42):
a good thing to talk. I mean, maybe it's the
reason why we can talk as humans, because we're supposed to.
And I think it's good. And I think a lot
of guys don't like to go to therapy, and then
they're looking for somebody who's going to be on there,
and they're looking for a referee more than a therapist,
(41:03):
and that's probably not the way to go in it.
I will say from my own personal experience that I
recommend it both individually and together. And I think that
it's helped me a lot in my life to sort
things out, you know, And I think what you do
is is, you know, is very helpful for people because
(41:27):
I mean, obviously, you know, there are a lot of
people here just trying to figure out who they are
and how to go about their lives and how to
be happy. And it's hard. It's hard to figure out
to be happy. I mean, there's no logical reason why
we should should be happy. It doesn't make sense. There
are so many people suffering, and there's so many sad
and bad things happening, and it feels selfish sometimes to
(41:51):
be happy. There's like, oh, yeah, great, things are going
great for you. But look what's you know, kids don't
have lunch, and I think that it takes a lot
to remember that that's not good for you and it's
not helping anybody. And if you really want to do something,
do something, don't just worry about it. And so that's
that's something that I think is important. And I also
(42:14):
found that, like you know, sometimes people want advice, and
sometimes I want advice, And sometimes people who are asking
you for advice don't really want to They don't want advice,
they just want something. And I always think that when
you're really down, when you're when you're feeling low, and
(42:36):
when you're looking for answers, helping other people is always
a help. It always makes you feel better. So if
there's a situation where you're feeling worthless, or you're you know,
you're feeling unloved or whatever, the best thing you can
do is to help someone else, because and for yourself,
(42:57):
not even for them. It's it's almost a selfish thing
to do, and I think it always works.
Speaker 2 (43:04):
I agree. I love that. I love that, Jimmy, You've
been amazing. Tonight. We end every on Purpose interview with
a final five. These questions have to be answered in
one word to one sentence maximum, So, Jimmy Kimmel, these
are your final five. The first question is what is
the best advice you've ever heard or received?
Speaker 1 (43:26):
Well, it's not be yourself. We learned that earlier. Listen, Listen,
that's the best advice.
Speaker 2 (43:36):
Who did you hear that from?
Speaker 1 (43:38):
I heard it from a priest, Yeah, a friend of
mine who's a priest. Yeah. I said, what do you
do when people come to you and they say, you know,
my son is dying and I don't believe in God?
He said, I just listened to them. Good advice speaking
about that.
Speaker 2 (43:55):
You've been very open about your son's heart condition, and
that's been some thing that I imagine is extremely difficult.
Speaker 1 (44:03):
Well not anymore because he's he's doing great, but it was,
yeah for sure.
Speaker 2 (44:08):
Yeah, Well what helped you at that time? What helps
you in such a difficult diet situation?
Speaker 1 (44:17):
And well, number one Children's hospital here in Los Angeles
help me. And the support, the support from family and strangers.
And I'm a religious person. I grew up going to church,
(44:42):
Catholic and all those things. But and I think that
the thoughts and prayers that gets thrown around a lot
people when they say they pray for you, that's to
take a moment of your day to stop and think
about out someone else and their child. It's a it's
(45:12):
a small sacrifice, but it's a meaningful one. Whether you
believe in prayer or not. It's I just think it's
powerful and meaningful. And I know that's more than one sentence,
but that's that's the answer.
Speaker 2 (45:29):
Thank you, June, thank you so much. That was actually
just question number one. I just I just snuck another
one in there. No question on the two, what is
the worst advice you ever had or receive?
Speaker 1 (45:44):
I you know, I don't really have an answer to that.
I think that the worst thing you can do, and
I've done it, and it's something that I've learned is
to is to lash out. You got to take a
beat and think about what you're saying, because you'll wish
(46:05):
you had.
Speaker 2 (46:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (46:07):
So sometimes there are people that you know, just want
you to bring down the hammer of four and that's
not usually the way I go.
Speaker 2 (46:17):
I like that, all right. Question on the three, what's
the first thing you do in the morning and the
last thing you do at night?
Speaker 1 (46:22):
Oh? Brush my teeth? Well, you mean besides pe I guess, uh, yeah,
you know. We have you know, we have an eight
year old and a ten year old in the house.
So he comes in, our eight year old and pounces
on us in the morning and I'd just like to
snuggle with him, and then he wants us to come
(46:42):
to bed with him at night and put him asleep
every night. And we know that we shouldn't do it
every night, but we just want to. We want to
get in there with him, and most of the time
we're very easy to convince. So those are the you know,
the best in the morning with the kids in the bed,
and then again at night with the kids in the bed.
Speaker 2 (47:02):
That all right? Last two questions, Question umber four. What's
something that you used to value that you no longer value?
Speaker 1 (47:11):
My parents? No, I love my parents, you know what.
I don't drink much anymore. I used to. You know,
I was never I never like had a problem or
anything like that. But I've just it's less interesting to me. Now.
Speaker 2 (47:32):
Why Why is that?
Speaker 1 (47:33):
Because I'm so high all the time? We call that
California sober, I believe you.
Speaker 2 (47:41):
Yeah, all right. Fifth, fifth and final question. We asked
this to every guest who's ever been on the show.
If you could create one law that everyone in the
world had to follow, what would it be.
Speaker 1 (47:55):
It's the golden rule, do unto others. That's it. That's so,
that's the whole thing. Still, that's all you If we
all did that, we would we'd be doing great.
Speaker 2 (48:07):
Yeah, Jimmy, You've got one special segment to wrap it
up for you. Okay, I want to show you something
behind you. If you can get the first one up,
take a.
Speaker 1 (48:19):
Look, that's me.
Speaker 2 (48:22):
What what advice would you give to your youngest self,
to that self, that youngest self.
Speaker 1 (48:27):
To young Jimmy Kimmel in the seventh grade? Play the
saxophone instead of the clarinet. You're never getting late?
Speaker 2 (48:37):
I love it. Can we get a second up? Looking
very daffa? What does what does Jimmy Kimmel need to hear?
Right now?
Speaker 1 (48:47):
Get away from that young boy? You mean me right,
both of you, and.
Speaker 2 (48:59):
Then let's get the one courtesy of my You.
Speaker 1 (49:01):
Know, honestly, I never even thought i'd own a suit,
so I'm ahead of the game right now. I think, Oh,
was that Ai Me in the future?
Speaker 2 (49:11):
Yes?
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Uh? Why is my beard the same color as it
is now?
Speaker 2 (49:17):
You're agent? Well, you're aging? Well, what do you hope
you'll feel about yourself at that age?
Speaker 1 (49:25):
I hope I don't look like that number one. I
do hope I have that much hair. I have a
feeling I am going to be replaced by an Ai
me at some point in the future. I hope I
wind up like my grandfather. And by that I don't
mean dead. I mean it's just somebody that everybody thinks
of and loves.
Speaker 2 (49:45):
Give it up for Jimmy, give everyone. Yes, Thank you
so much, Thanks Shay. If you love this episode, I
need you to listen to one of my favorite conversations ever.
It's with the one and only Tom Holland on how
to overcome your social anxiety, especially in situations where you're
not drinking and everyone else is. We talk about his
(50:08):
sobriety journey and so much more. He gets really personal.
I can't wait for you to hear it. It's gonna
blow your mind. The quote is, if you have a
problem with me, text me.
Speaker 1 (50:17):
And if you don't have my number, you don't know
me well enough to have a problem with me.
Host
Jay Shetty
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