Jimmy Kimmel has been the talk of the entertainment industry for the past week, after ABC decided to suspend Jimmy Kimmel Live! following controversial comments from the host on the air. Now, after immediate responses from celebrities at the time and some of Hollywood's biggest stars signing a letter recently opposing the suspension, he's on his way back to late night on September 23. He broke his social media silence hours before the broadcast, however, with an Instagram post honoring a comedy great that earned responses from celebrities like Jamie Foxx, Rosie O'Donnell, and more.
Instead of using social media to directly comment on his suspension or any of the developments that followed, Kimmel posted an image of him posing with the late, great Norman Lear. Take a look:
September 23 isn't the anniversary of Norman Lear's birth or death, so it seems likely that Kimmel is "missing" the comedy great for reasons tied to the return of Jimmy Fallon Live! While Lear is of course known for his work on sitcoms like All in the Family, The Jeffersons, and Maude, he was also an activist who reportedly made an enemy of Richard Nixon back in the day.
Kimmel was among those who shared tributes when Lear died in 2023, and some big names took to his Instagram comment section today ahead of Jimmy Kimmel Live!'s return to both remember Lear and support the host in his highly-publicized sticky situation with ABC. Take a look at some of the comments:
- Jamie Foxx: "God bless he’s looking down. Proud of you."
- Rosie O'Donnell: "Kill it tonight - feel all the love ❤️"
- Phil Rosenthal: "He is proud of you."
- Alyssa Milano: "I can honestly say, his legacy lives on and he would’ve been very proud of how you’ve used your platform and navigated that last week. You’re a national treasure. Thank you for risking it all."
- Justin Theroux: "Awww. That good man. Now go get em meathead! 🙌"
Kimmel and Norman Lear collaborated on several projects in the years prior to his death, and the former only had good things to say about the TV legend following his death. Even if the expectation may have been that Kimmel would address his show's suspension sooner than anything else on social media, I'd say that he made an implied statement by simply saying that he was missing the activist in the hours leading up to the first broadcast of Jimmy Kimmel Live! since the suspension last week.
Check out his tribute to Lear shortly after he died in 2023:
The first episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live! since the suspension last week will be broadcast on ABC on Tuesday, September 23 in his usual time slot at 11:35 p.m. ET. The episode won't be available everywhere, however, since Sinclair Broadcast Group will continue preempting the show across its ABC affiliate stations. Still, I think many more eyes than usual will be on ABC tonight, if only to see Kimmel's first opening monologue back on the air.
Other late night show hosts of course reacted to Jimmy Kimmel being suspended, which comes just months after CBS' controversial cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. Jon Stewart and Jimmy Fallon had surprisingly similar approaches on The Daily Show and The Tonight Show, respectively. Kimmel will presumably have a lot more to say in his monologue than in his tribute to Norman Lear, but it's nice to see his post getting support from fellow celebrities and fans alike. See Kimmel's first episode back tonight at 11:35 p.m. ET on ABC.
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