Who needs “Mr. Personality when you’ve got Jimmy Kimmel?
Following such solid citizens as Mike Tyson, Don King and Slash, Monica Lewinsky will cohost ABC’s late-night “Jimmy Kimmel Live” next week.
“Our producers just called and asked her,” says Kimmel. “After a lot of conversation, she agreed.” (We love playing hard to get.)
Lewinsky, now hosting Fox’s latest “reality” show, “Mr. Personality,” will appear Wednesday through Friday on the L.A.-based “Live.”
Reruns will fill the 12:05-to-1:05 a.m. EDT slot Monday and Tuesday while Kimmel is in New York to yuk it up for ABC’s fall-season presentation to advertisers.
“The more interesting the cohost, the better the show,” says Kimmel. “When guests come on and sit next to Mike Tyson or Monica Lewinsky or Don King, it changes the tone of the whole show.”
Since its post-Super Bowl launch Jan. 26 – during which an audience member hurled after soaking up the free beer – Kimmel’s raucous “Live” has scored surprisingly strong ratings. (Disney capped the keg after the premiere.)
Thus far in 2003, Kimmel is averaging 1.8 million viewers. NBC’s Conan O’Brien and CBS’s Craig Kilborn, both 12:30 to 1:30 a.m. EDT, average 2.4 million and 1.7 million, respectively.
In their common half-hour (12:30 to 1 a.m.), Kimmel routinely beats Kilborn in the key male demographics – historically the most difficult group for advertisers to reach.
What makes that even more impressive is that Kimmel is carried in only 92 percent of the country, while NBC’s and CBS’s late-night shows reach 99 percent, according to ABC.
NBC’s Jay Leno and CBS’s David Letterman, both 11:35 p.m. to 12:35 a.m. EDT, lead the pack in “03 with 5.7 million and 4.0 million viewers.
“My goal is to do well enough to be around when these guys retire,” says Kimmel, 35. “I obsess over the ratings, but I always did, even when I was in radio. It’s almost like checking the Mets scores.”
Former cohost of Comedy Central’s popular game show “Win Ben Stein’s Money,” Kimmel shot into the spotlight with “The Man Show,” which he cocreated and cohosted for four seasons, until Sunday.
To describe it as cable’s version of “Animal House” would be kind. Each episode featured bra-less women bouncing on a trampoline, with Kimmel and his cohost, Adam Carolla, guzzling beer on the air. (Dudes.)
“It was like a bachelor party every show,” Kimmel recalls. “People would come to the show drunk.”
In real life, Kimmel says that he’s not a big boozer, and that he lives a rather ordinary life. He cooks a lot at home, where he lives with his young son and daughter and his kid brother, a producer on the show.
Kimmel goes in for a few indulgences. Like the five large built-in TVs in his living room, so he can watch five football games at once. (He has six other sets throughout the house.)
Kimmel acknowledges he’s had a tough time booking A-list guests. Particularly during sweeps months, when the heavyweights can demand exclusivity.
“We’re doing poorly,” Kimmel acknowledges. “I asked Dave Letterman, who’s my idol, to be my first guest. He sent me a funny little note that I keep in my dressing room – “Thanks for asking me to be on your premiere, but I will be out of the country on business.’ “
Truth be told, Kimmel “would be horribly nervous” if Letterman showed up. (Kimmel’s been on “The Late Show” five times.)
“It would probably be one of the worst days of my life. If Dave showed any sign of disliking me, it would ruin me.”
Oh, we almost forgot. Ed McMahon will join Kimmel the week of May 19.
– his first cohost gig since he and the legendary Johnny Carson retired from NBC’s “Tonight” in 1992.
More Oprah?
Buzz in the biz is that daytime talk queen Oprah Winfrey has changed her mind (again) and won’t hang it up after the 2005-06 season.
Word has it that Winfrey will add two more years to her zillion-dollar deal with syndicator King World, which means her show would run through the “07-08 season.
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