The Tonight Show’s Jimmy Fallon took the stage one day after Jimmy Kimmel’s late night talk show was suspended indefinitely.
Fallon, 50, shared a statement about Kimmel, 57, during the Thursday, September 18, episode of his show.
“Well guys, the big story is that Jimmy Kimmel was suspended by ABC after pressure from the FCC, leaving everyone thinking WTF,” Fallon said at the top of the show. “This morning I woke up to 100 text messages from my dad saying, ‘I’m sorry they canceled your show.’ I go, ‘That’s not me, that’s Jimmy Kimmel.’ But to be honest with you all, I don’t know what’s going on and no one does, but I do know Jimmy Kimmel, and he is a decent, loving and funny guy, and I hope he comes back.”
Fallon continued, “A lot of people are worried that we won’t keep saying what we want to say or that we’ll be censored, but I’m going to cover the president’s trip to the U.K. like I normally would. Here we go. Well guys, President Trump just wrapped up his three-day trip to the U.K. and he looked …” he trailed off, before a voice-over chimed in to say, “incredibly handsome.”
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“As always, his tie was …” Fallon once again trailed off as the voice overhead said, “Exactly the right length.”
“And his hair looked …,” Fallon said, as the announcer added, “better than Conrad’s from The Summer I Turned Pretty.”
“During the trip, protesters managed to project images onto the sides of Windsor Castle of Trump, standing next to his good friend Jeff …,” Fallon said, as the announcer added, “Goldblum.”
The back-and-forth between Fallon and the announcer continued throughout the show’s opening, with the announcer ending the segment by saying, “I hereby nominate him for the Nobel Peace Prize,” and Fallon saying, “And you can quote me on that! See, we can still say what we want.”
Hours before The Tonight Show aired, Fallon made headlines when he dropped out of a scheduled New York City appearance — where he and Bozoma St. John were to talk about his new NBC series, On Brand.
“Unfortunately, Jimmy Fallon is no longer able to attend today’s session,” the Fast Company Innovation Festival said in a statement on Thursday, per Deadline. Representatives for the festival told a Deadline reporter that there would be no further comment on the situation.
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One day prior, news broke that Kimmel would be taken off air following his controversial comments about late conservative political activist Charlie Kirk.
“Jimmy Kimmel Live will be pre-empted indefinitely,” an ABC spokesperson confirmed to Us Weekly on Wednesday, September 17.
A rerun of Celebrity Family Feud aired on Wednesday in place of Jimmy Kimmel Live! Us reached out to Kimmel for comment.
Kimmel caused a stir on Monday, September 15, when he discussed Kirk’s accused killer, Tyler Robinson. (Kirk died at age 31 after he was shot at a Utah Valley University event on September 10.)
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“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them with everything they can to score political points from,” Kimmel said at the time. “In between the finger pointing, there was grieving.”
Robinson, who is currently in jail, is charged with capital offense aggravated murder and felony discharge of a firearm. He also faces multiple counts of obstruction of justice, witness tampering and commission of a violent offense in the presence of a child.
After his remark, Kimmel showed a clip of President Donald Trump being asked how he’s coping with Kirk’s death and talking to reporters about the White House ballroom construction. Kimmel quipped that Trump was taking the news “hard,” adding, “He’s at the fourth stage of grief, construction. It’s demolition, construction.”
“This is not how an adult grieves the murder of someone he called a friend,” Kimmel continued. “This is how a four-year-old mourns a goldfish.”
Nexstar Media reportedly threatened to axe the show, with the company — which owns multiple TV stations — telling Variety in a statement on Wednesday that they “strongly” objected to “recent comments made by Mr. Kimmel concerning the killing of Charlie Kirk.”
