Jimmy Kimmel's Wife Recalls Stopping Him from Reading Donald Trump's Comment at the Oscars
She tried but he defied. Molly McNearney, the wife of the late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, advised her husband not to read aloud ex-president Donald Trump's "worst host" review before the Oscar audience. However, as the world now knows, he turned a deaf ear to his wife, and it became the funniest moment of the night.
Although Kimmel didn't tell who tried to stop him, McNearney, who also co-executive produced the Oscar telecast, revealed it was her. "I will tell you, I'm really not proud of this, but I tried to talk Jimmy out of reading that. I feel like my instincts are usually right, but I was totally off on that."
The 46-year-old admitted it was a "risk" that her husband took, and all she wanted was for the joke to end well. Also, McNearney didn't favor it because she wouldn't like to give Trump any airtime if it was her way. "And he asked why. I said, 'I don't want to give Trump airtime in the Oscars. This is the one time we don't have to talk about him. We talk about him every night … this night is not about him and it's not about politics.'"
"I just wanted to make sure it ended well, and I didn't want it to end on a sour note," she added, However, Kimmel reassured his wife and said the joke would resonate with the audience, "He had a glimmer in his eye, and he said, 'I got this.' He really did. This is where he shines."
After the ceremony, Kimmel appeared alongside Kelly and Ripa and admitted efforts had been made to refrain him from bringing the controversial political figure onto the Oscar stage. However, the host didn't let his wife's name slip. Later when McNearney came out and confessed, she also joked, "I will tell you, I'm never going to win an argument in my household again."
Further in her interview with Variety regarding all things Oscar, McNearney said, "We were definitely stressed out because we had to have certain celebrities in their seats. We talk to people in the monologue. And in order for that to pay off, you want to see their reactions. So we pushed by five minutes, which didn't feel like too much."
Since the stars were still landing, Kimmel had time. So he extended the monologue with his quick wit and jokes, including the Trump review. "I honestly have tried to do that math in my head nine times, and it's still not making sense to me," McNearney said of that extra time. She said one of Kimmel's writers came running to show him what Trump wrote on his Truth Social, and bam, it worked.
Meanwhile, when asked if Kimmel would return to the Oscars for the fifth time, Rob Mills, the exec VP of unscripted and alternative entertainment at Walt Disney Television, said, "I mean, I will certainly beg him to do it. If he wants to sign a lifetime contract, I would love that. I really hope he comes back."
