If you thought that the only major shakeup in late night television before the end of the 2025 TV schedule would be The Late Show with Stephen Colbert being cancelled by CBS, ABC and Nexstar proved you wrong. Production on Jimmy Kimmel Live! was suspended "indefinitely" just hours before Kimmel's next new episode was set to film. A big question in the aftermath was how other late night hosts would react, especially after the strong reactions to Colbert's cancellation in July. Jon Stewart of The Daily Show and Jimmy Fallon of The Tonight Show were first up.
Their opening monologues were actually surprisingly similar, and not just because both hosts chose to wear red ties for the episodes that aired on September 18. Instead of sharing any hot takes on the situation like other celebs shared on social media about Kimmel's suspension, both took the approach of pretending to be – to quote Stewart – "administration compliant." The Daily Show episode was the first to air, so let's start there.
Jon Stewart On The Daily Show
Compared to Jon Stewart's rant when The Late Show was cancelled, he was downright restrained in his on-screen reaction to Jimmy Kimmel Live! getting suspended. In fact, he didn't even mention Jimmy Kimmel until about ten minutes in, and his approach was to deliver his monologue like he was in a hostage situation and forced to say what he was saying, to the mirth of the studio audience.
In fact, Stewart didn't even mention Jimmy Kimmel until about ten minutes in, but it was already clear that the Comedy Central was going to deliver something memorable by bringing Stewart in on a Thursday when he's usually the Monday host.
The broadcast largely used video clips of President Trump and other networks rather than Stewart making direct commentary. That's not to say that he leaned into the Daily Show style of comedy from start to finish, and he got more sincere when he noted that "it's not really about the specific words." He said instead that it's "about having a basic sense of humanity." Take a look for yourself:
New episodes of The Daily Show air Monday - Thursday on Comedy Central at 11 p.m. ET, with Stewart hosting on Mondays. As for The Tonight Show, Fallon's approach was similar to Stewart's in some key ways but quite different in others.
Jimmy Fallon On The Tonight Show
Jimmy Fallon wasted no time in explicitly addressing the late night TV elephant in the room, bringing up Jimmy Kimmel in the first moments of his monologue. His opening joke was:
Jimmy Kimmel was suspended by ABC after pressure from the FCC, leaving everybody thinking, WTF?
Fallon went on to crack a joke about getting texts from his dad that was almost identical to a joke he cracked after The Late Show with Stephen Colbert got the axe. He clarified that The Tonight Show won't be censored and that he'd cover "the President's trip the U.K. like I normally would."
Somewhat similarly to The Daily Show, The Tonight Show's approach was to seemingly "let" Jimmy Fallon go off about the situation while dubbing over his words with gentler language. Based on the cheers from the audience, a crowd-favorite joke was when his joke about POTUS' hair was dubbed over with "–– better than Conrad's from The Summer I Turned Pretty."
Like Stewart, Fallon did have some very sincere moments, including what he said about the man who had been his ABC counterpart:
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's a decent, funny, and loving guy and I hope he comes back.
Most of the rest of the episode of The Tonight Show seemed set to go on as usual, but you can check out Jimmy Fallon's monologue below:
New episodes of The Tonight Show air on Monday - Thursday at 11:35 p.m. ET on NBC. It remains to been seen if there any major new developments regarding the future (or lack thereof) of Jimmy Kimmel Live! in the coming days to be addressed in late night TV monologues.
At the time of writing, Late Night with Seth Meyers has not yet aired to reveal how one NBC late night host's monologue compares to the other.
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