Jimmy Kimmel sees the end of his late night tenure on the horizon

Jimmy Kimmel Live! will likely come to an end in the next three years, the host says

By Mary Kate Carr | February 21, 2024 | 7:29pm

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Jimmy Kimmel sees the end of his late night tenure on the horizon

Jimmy Kimmel Photo: Mindy Small

Jimmy Kimmel admitted on his podcast Strike Force Five that he was about ready to quit the talk show biz right before the writers strike, when he realized “Oh yeah, it’s kinda nice to work.” But now that the strike is over, he’s envisioning quitting again. “I think this is my final contract,” he says in a new interview with the Los Angeles Times. “I hate to even say it, because everyone’s laughing at me now—each time I think that, and then it turns out to be not the case. I still have a little more than two years left on my contract, and that seems pretty good. That seems like enough.”

The comedian has already hosted Jimmy Kimmel Live! for more than 20 years, so it’s understandable that he might be weary of the grind. (Plus, he’s been saying he’s ready to quit for years now.) When he’s inundated with work, “I think, ‘I cannot wait until my contract is over,’” he said, “But then, I take the summer off or I go on strike, and you start going, ‘Yeah, I miss the fun stuff.’”

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There’s fun stuff on the other side of the talk show, presumably. But Kimmel isn’t sure what his next chapter will look like, beyond the fact that “whenever I think of what I’m going to do when I stop working, it all involves more work.” However, he reflected that “It might not be anything that anyone other than me is aware of. I have a lot of hobbies—I love to cook, I love to draw, I imagine myself learning to do sculptures. I know that when I die, if I’m fortunate enough to die on my own terms in my own bed, I’m going to think, ‘Oh, I was never able to get to this, and I was never able to get to that.’ I just know it about myself.”

Here’s what the next chapter won’t look like. “I won’t be doing stand-up after I stop doing the [talk] show—I am uncomfortable with it,” he revealed. Whatever it is won’t be a solo endeavor at all, it sounds like: “I love being a team player.”