Back on the airways this week is Jimmy Kimmel. According to Deadline, his opening monologue from Tuesday’s episode of Jimmy Kimmel Live! has become one of his most-watched ever on YouTube. After Kimmel’s opening monologue was posted as a 23-minute YouTube video, it racked up more than 11 million views in just over 12 hours. Some of his past monologues did not get as many views, such as Kimmel’s reaction to President Trump’s election win, which garnered 9 million views, and the monologue about the Harvest music festival tragedy received 10 million views.
Deadline mentions the last video on Kimmel’s YouTube channel to peak anywhere close to this one was over a year ago, when he spoke with Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, and 50 Cent in March of last year. It has since gained 16 million views. Kimmel’s monologues usually bring in about two to four million views a given week. Another most-watched monologue was eight years ago when Kimmel spoke about the birth of his second son and all of his health complications. That video currently has 14 million views.
Kimmel himself expected the increased viewership, joking that his ratings were likely to skyrocket after being suspended by ABC indefinitely due to comments he made about the killer of conservative activist, Charlie Kirk. Deadline reports his suspension was followed by threats from Brendan Carr, chairman of the FCC, that the network should “find ways to change conduct, to take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the FCC ahead.” In this fraught battle for free speech, Carr has since mentioned the FCC aiming at ABC’s daytime talk show, The View.
According to Deadline, following days of discussions between Disney and Kimmel, the host received support from his peers and celebrities, including Mark Ruffalo (13 Going on 30, The Kids Are Alright), Meryl Streep (The Devil Wears Prada, Doubt) and Tom Hanks (Castaway, The Terminal). Even Texas Republican Ted Cruz spoke out against the government punishing anyone for free speech, a violation of the First Amendment.
Throughout the monologue, Kimmel thanked all of the voices who stood up for him, saying, “This show is not important; what’s important is that we get to live in a country that allows us to have a show like this,” via Deadline.
View the monologue in its entirety here.