Opinion | Jimmy Kimmel Made a Joke. Then Marjorie Taylor Greene Called the Police on Him.

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(SINGING) When you walk in a room, do you have sway?

I’m interviewing all the hosts. I did Sam Bee, I did Jon Stewart. And now you, which I’m very excited.

Oh, Jesus, now the pressure’s on, huh?

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I’m Kara Swisher, and you’re listening to “Sway.” My guest today is Jimmy Kimmel, the ABC late night host. He’s a veteran comic and a famous prankster. But Kimmel also uses his platform to go after powerful people who deserve their fair share of ridicule. Most recently, Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene, who is, let’s be clear, a font of material. I was curious to talk to Kimmel about how he decides where to cast his comic spotlight and whether the nation can’t take a joke anymore.

Jimmy Kimmel, welcome to “Sway.” It’s great to have you here.

Thank you for having me. It’s great to be here.

All right, should we just get started?

Sure.

So I wanted to start, I think, with the news, which is the dust-up with Georgia Congresswoman Marjorie Taylor Greene. You’ve gotten into dust-ups all the time. But you made a joke, and she called the police on you. Explain what happened from your perspective.

Well, I made a joke that I didn’t even — sometimes you don’t even imagine these people will see this stuff. But then you have to think about it, and you’re like, oh, yeah, she wants to be famous. That’s her goal. That does seem to be what she’s in it for. And in fact, for years, I kind of — you go back and forth between, should I put any kind of a spotlight on this person? I mean, do I want to be a part of making this person famous? And with some people, you reach a point where it just happens and you just go with it. And I think she just did enough stupid things that she became famous. I think 15 years ago, she probably would have been in a reality show or something. But unfortunately, she’s in Congress. She said something horrible.

She called three Republican senators who voted to confirm Judge Jackson to the Supreme Court pro-pedophile. And you said —

And I said, where’s Will Smith when you need him? And obviously, a joke but. She decided to make something out of it, I think probably for fundraising purposes. And I think it backfired on her, because, I mean, you expect the left to laugh at her. You expect the liberals and people who dislike her to be on my side and to laugh. But nobody really — other than Matt Gaetz, which I don’t know if you want him on your team in the first place. Even that side of the aisle recognize that. And it’s one thing to be a hypocrite constantly complaining about cancel culture, but it’s another thing to be so oblivious that you call the police on someone over a joke.

Yeah, exactly. So she reported a threat of violence against her. Obviously it was a stunt. And it’s ironic, given she voted against the Capitol Police getting medals after January 6th and things like that.

Yeah, well maybe now, she’ll give them a medal or something if they come and carry me away. Maybe that was the deal that was struck. But I wasn’t particularly worried about it. But it was weird, I never had — I was thinking about the fact that I had never had anyone call the police on me before.

So you’re a goody two shoes in other words. But did the Capitol police call you?

No, no one called. I don’t even necessarily believe that she called the police. I would assume there’s some record of that, but I’m too lazy to dig it up.

Yeah. So you talked about this just now — you get a monologue, she gets airtime. And who knows? Maybe it helps her fundraise. It’s like our media ecosystem. The polls feed off each other, and we propagate the very thing we’re arguing against. How do you look at your responsibility and then the responsibility of you know, the Facebooks and Twitter whose business is it to do this?

I have to say, if I was running Facebook or Twitter, I think my position would be, there are millions of people out there posting millions of things. How are we supposed to keep a handle on this stuff? And it really is a mammoth proposition if you think about it. And maybe they could say, well, we’re just going to watch what the verified users are saying and doing. But ultimately, I think it’s every individual’s responsibility to be responsible with what they say.

And unfortunately, the anonymity allows people to almost play characters. I think that — you know, I get a lot of death threats, a lot of them. Maybe more than you might guess I get. I get them by mail, I get them by social media. I get them in various forms. I get telephone calls. People find my phone number at home. People have come to my home.

Over what issues?

Mostly over Trump. It’s almost exclusively Trump related stuff. And I’ve just come to realize that I can’t live my life worrying about it and being fearful. And that most of them are just shooting their mouths off. Most of these people have no intention of doing anything to anyone. And they don’t even think about what they’re saying. And I have to believe that if confronted, many of these people would regret saying what they said.

I mean, when human being meets human being, the human beings tend to go, oh, I’m sorry, I really didn’t think of you as a person, I was just —

I just don’t like Jimmy Kimmel on T.V.

Yeah.

So when you think about these platforms, is it just giving these people more of a voice than they used to have, or is it something much different that’s happening? And is that you never saw this stuff before, presumably. People just yelled at the T.V.

I think it’s easier now. I think when something is easy to do — like in the old days, you’d have to write a letter and mail it and get the address and all of those things. And those steps sometimes slow people down enough to prevent them from doing it. But they’ve always been crazy people. You know, David Letterman had a woman in his house a few different times basically lying in wait for him, so —

She wanted to marry him or thought she was married to him.

Yeah, I know. But at that point, which would you rather have to spend the rest of your life with someone, or be killed? I don’t know. I think I’d probably choose killed at that point.

Do you blame social media at all or do you think about it? Because you use it quite a bit yourself, and so you get into these roundelays.

I don’t blame it really any more than I blame the post office or I blame the telephone company. I think that this is something — there are a lot of uses for social media. There’s no question they could do a better job. I don’t have the answers to them. If I did, I’d share them. But I think one thing you might want to do, this could be an interesting thing, is that everyone has to take some kind of standardized IQ test. And then that number has to be in your social media handle.

So we just know where you’re coming from. You know? You get some angry email, and it says 83. And you’re like, all right, it’s an 83. Why do I care what they have to say?

What happens when you get a — whatever, what’s high? 146?

Well, yeah, 146 is very high, yes.

Yeah. So you have to listen to them.

Well, if you get a 146, yeah, you have to take it into consideration, for sure.

What would Trump’s number be?

Trump’s number, well, if you asked him, it would be like a 164. But if you actually gave him the test, I’m guessing he wouldn’t do well on it.

Yeah, man, person, woman, whatever that was. He’s very smart.

Yeah, right, yeah.

He’s a very smart person. So the Marjorie Taylor Greene thing is a moment, right? But there’s more and more of this. What stops us from.sort of degenerating into everybody’s a comic, except most people aren’t funny?

Well, I think it’s the response that you get. I think that if people are saying — clearly, Donald Trump, Jr., thinks he’s funny.

There’s a group of people who will hit that little like button when he says something. He posted the Easter Bunny with a machine gun and said, come and take it. What does this even mean? But you, you look at it, and there are a lot of people liked it. And I don’t think they know why they liked it, I think it’s just who it came from.

But um, when something’s funny, you really know. You could tell, people do have a — there’s a difference in how they respond when something is really funny and cuts through. And I think that if you get that, it encourages you. And if you get nothing, you’re probably going to stop or slow down.

Mhm. You did talk about thinking twice about giving someone like Marjorie Taylor Greene the spotlight, because she uses these mediums quite a lot. Do you hold back a lot, or do you figure, she’s getting coverage anyway?

I do hold back a lot, but something like that, I didn’t see any upside for her, really. Because I felt like this was one of the rare situations where even her people would go, it was a joke.

So you didn’t even want to be in the political limelight. It seemed like Trump dragged you into covering politics. A 2017 New York article called you, quote, “a genial lightweight” who has emerged as a, quote, “central voice in the national debate about health care legislation.” How did that shift for you?

Well, it’s interesting, first of all, when a compliment is an insult. Genial lightweight. It’s like, I know he’s not talking about —

I think that’s an insult.

— my actual weight. But, yeah, I guess. Although the genial, I mean, you take what you can get. I think it was Trump to start. And —

So what happened? Were you just offended? Or did you just think great comedy material, or what?

No. I definitely did not think great comedy material. And never imagined he would be elected president. It shook me in a way, the fact that he won. I actually said to Hillary Clinton during a commercial break once when she was on my show, I hope Trump wins the nomination, because you know, it pretty much guarantees you’re going to win. And she said, be careful what you wish for. And at the time, I thought it was funny.

But now I realize that she took the threat more seriously than I did.

And he — any reasonable person — forget being a talk show host. I think any reasonable person sees this impulsive, stupid, egocentric and thereby dangerous man running the country, and you must sound the alarm. Because the truth is, a lot of Americans take their cues from jokes. And if we act like this as normal, people will think it’s normal. It isn’t normal.

George Bush was the president, Obama was the president. And I made jokes about all of them. But they have to do something dumb to warrant a joke.

Like wear a khaki suit, for example.

Yeah, like wear a khaki suit, yeah. Something horrific like that.

Or choke on a pretzel or something like that.

Yeah. And so um — I did think it was important not just for me, but for all of us who do this to remind people that this is not normal. It’s not OK. And it’s not a matter of liberal versus conservative. It’s not a matter of Democrat versus Republican. It’s a matter of reasonable people looking at a crazy person who is running our country and who is lifting other crazy people up and bringing them into the White House and letting them make decisions that affect all of our lives. And I just don’t know how you could not be political in that situation.

Comics have sort of led the way. And not just you, Colbert, John Oliver, and everything. You’re the toughest — it’s sort of Mark Twain-y, I suppose, in that regard. But do you think it’s effective when delivered as a joke rather than being righteous and angry?

I do think that there’s an effectiveness. The cumulative effect of the jokes I think make an impact. I mean, if you go back even to President Ford and Chevy Chase’s imitation of him as a clumsy man. I mean, the man, as far as I know, was a pretty good athlete and not necessarily any clumsier than anybody else. But when I was a kid, I thought he was a clumsy guy. You know? And I think that those caricatures that we create become reality to a certain extent.

And Donald Trump came in as a caricature. And —

Well, Palin. Palin’s another example.

And Sarah Palin, yeah, was another one. I’m not saying that all Democrats are good and all Republicans are bad. I think that’s a silly notion. But these people are like — they don’t even have the decency to pretend they’re not horrible. You know?

Do you think the meme-ification of Trump made Trump more Trumpy in that regard? He was like, oh, you’re going to joke about me? I’m going to double down on evil, or something.

Maybe. I don’t know. I don’t know him. I’ve met him a couple of times. And I feel like I understand his —

Where did you meet him?

He was on the show a couple of times. He was on once when he was the host of “The Apprentice” and another time when he was running. Which I thought was a joke, of course. And —

What was your impression of him?

He’s like a team mascot or something. He’s a character. He will say anything. He’s a really good talk show guest, because he’s not guarded and he will — he’ll light a fire. He’ll throw a Molotov cocktail. And a lot of people like that. And it’s fun when you’re a talk show host to have somebody like that. But it’s not fun when they become president. And I always shudder at the idea that any of us, me included, liked having him as president, because it made our jobs easier. It didn’t make our jobs easier. It made our jobs harder.

And more importantly, it divided the country in a way that we’ve not ever seen in our lifetimes.

Would you have him on your show now?

You know, I would actually.

OK.

Because there are so many things I want to say to him. And I know what would happen. There would be a hew of outrage from my friends on the left and also outrage from those on the right who saw me interview him. There are a lot of things I would like to say to him and ask him. And um —

What would be your first question?

My first question. Boy, I don’t even know where I would start with him.

What would you like to say to him, then?

Well —

We can workshop it. Go ahead.

I just really want to tell him that, I know you think you are the best president, with the possible exception of Abraham Lincoln, that we’ve ever had in this country. But I just want to let you know that you are the worst president we have ever had. How’s that hit you? Tough guy?

OK, that’s not a question, but it works.

I know. I mean, it would not be —

It’s hard to talk with — I’ve talked to many psychologists. A narcissist doesn’t really hear that. Especially a malignant one, you know.

Yeah, but the audience would. And they would laugh at him, and that would bother him.

Yeah. I have a first question.

What would your first question be for him.

I’m sorry your parents didn’t love you very much. How did that feel? My parents love me. I don’t think they did. I don’t — how many — were you not hugged enough? I think I’d start with his parents. I think I would start — that’s where I think it all began.

I was saving that question for Don, Jr. But yeah, I think you’re — you go back to the source. You’re right, though, by the way. I do have moments where I have some empathy, because that is clearly the case.

Yeah. Someone wasn’t hugged enough. Often when I’m interviewing people and I have a problem with someone, I always say, ah, their parents didn’t hug them enough.

Yeah. If only it were that simple.

Yes, exactly. I think he’s impermeable. In any case, he’s become the character he is, and he’s now living that character. The pivotal moment, of course, of your political coverage, though, if we want to call it that, was in 2017 — it wasn’t comedy. You famously opened up about your son Billy’s health problems. He was born with a congenital heart disease and had to have open heart surgery right after he was born. You talked about being with him at the hospital right around the time Trump was trying to dismantle Obamacare. Let’s hear a clip.

Wow. As someone with many children, I just, I cried during that particular segment. That’s a gut puncher.

Yeah. Yeah. It was.

So tell us why you decided to do this. I thought it was wonderful. It was genuine. It was you. Obviously, illness of a child is probably the worst thing. It can happen to a lot of people. Why did you decide to take a stand on this, and how did this evolve?

Well, the timing was very — you know, some people believe things happen for a reason. And I don’t know that I’m one of those people, but the timing was extraordinary in that that happened to be going on when we thought we were going to have a normal birth and happy, healthy birth, as I’d had for my three older children. And when that didn’t happen and when I saw what people were going through, I mean to really see it is — I mean, heart surgeries are not great, but they’re a lot better than a lot of things.

And to see these Republicans who wanted to do away with Obamacare because they knew that it was popular and they knew what it was. We did a bit on our show a few years previous in which we asked people what they thought of Obamacare. And then we asked them what they thought of the Affordable Care Act. And we asked Republicans these questions. And it was interesting, because every one of them said they were all for the Affordable Care Act, and every one of them said they were against Obamacare.

And so this labeling, this branding that went wrong, really hurt the good that was done. And in fact, I think most people agreed with me. I think probably the vast majority of Americans, if not politicians, agreed with me when I spoke about health care. And then the machinery kicks in. And then they wait a couple weeks and they wait till the emotion is out of the story. And then they start with like, oh, Chuck Schumer told him to say those things, become something other than what it actually was. Which was me trying to make something good out of something bad and scary.

And I think that they were very effective in positioning me in the way that they wanted to position me. But I think I’m just seen to be — you know, I’m on the blue side and a cheerleader for the Democrats, and that’s it. And fine. I mean, whatever. Maybe that’s true. But in this particular case, I think most of us agree on this. I think if you look at the polls and you take the politics out of it, we definitely agree on this. And it saves people’s lives.

And they may not accept that. They may not acknowledge it because they don’t want to, because it’s not what they’re hearing on Fox News. But it’s true. And um —

So no regrets of having done that? Talking —

No, none at all. Not at all. Not at all. I mean, if it had even a one 1/100 of a percent of an effect on the way that vote went, then I’m glad that I did it. And I’m glad I did anyway, because it’s what I believe. That’s it. I mean, it doesn’t matter. It really doesn’t matter to me, having 100 percent. of the country inclined to watch my show. That’s not how I think.

So it’s not a calculation you put in that if they decide you’re this, as people divide, they won’t do anything together. Although I think it was Charles Grassley who just said they’re not going to touch Obamacare. If they win the Senate, they’re not going to do it again.

Of course they won’t. Because they know that what they want to do is say how terrible it is. They know it isn’t. So they can’t take health care away from their own constituents, the people that put them in there. People are going to notice that. I mean, they may get confused when it comes to critical race theory and all these issues that they’ve cooked up to get people excited, but they’re going to know when their doctor bills aren’t being paid.

How is your son now?

He’s great. He’s turning five this week, as a matter of fact.

Congratulations.

Thank you. [MUSIC]

We’ll be back in a minute. If you like this interview and want to hear others, follow us on your favorite podcast app. You’ll be able to catch up on “Sway” episodes you may have missed, like my conversation with Jon Stewart. And you’ll get new ones delivered directly to you. More with Jimmy Kimmel after the break.

Let’s talk about the news. Because one of these things is it’s really hard to touch news now, because everything becomes so partisan no matter what it is. For example, Elon Musk’s move to buy Twitter. People on the right thinks he’s their savior, people on the left thinks he’s a potential almost fascist. And everybody seems to have an opinion this is just a rich person buying a private public space. Any thoughts on that?

Well, I do think it is — boy, we have some real imbalance when it comes to the media in this country. For instance, as a part of a broadcast television network, I’m subject to equal time laws. I have to give equal time to candidates, unless it’s in straight interview type situation. They are very strict and very careful about this. And I’ve been in situations where complaints have been made to local affiliates, and then you have to figure out a way to give equal time to the other 30 people who are running for office in that particular job.

And the truth is now that network television is just a small part of the little piece of the big pie. We’ve got streaming, and we’ve got cable, which is not subject to that. And then we’ve got Twitter and we’ve got Facebook. And my way of thinking is if you’re going to keep an eye on what goes on on broadcast television because it’s part of the public airwaves, which are — it’s just strange to think about nowadays anyway, because what difference is there between Wi-Fi and a VHF signal? But are we going to apply that to Twitter, to Facebook, to et cetera?

I don’t know that the answer is yes.

Do I think it’s better that Donald Trump is not on Twitter? One hundred percent, I do. Should everyone be allowed on Twitter? I don’t know. Maybe. I know that I probably wouldn’t be thrilled if Joe Biden was banned from Twitter. Of course, Joe Biden hasn’t been a major misinformation machine, and of course this is arguable, done a huge amount of damage to our country. But it’s not so easy. It’s not so clear.

What do you think about Elon buying it?

I think it’s so dangerous to have one person in charge of that. In the same way it’s so dangerous to have one person in charge of nuclear weapons.

Yeah. Although, he’s just — he trolls tweets. And he’s an edge lord. What about cancel culture? How do you think about that?

I think it’s much too broad a term, cancel culture. I think that —

I agree. It’s like fake news or —

Yeah, exactly. It’s like some people deserve it, and some people maybe don’t. And some people definitely don’t. And then also we have this very charming new way of operating now where we love to pile on people and we love to tear people to shreds, whether we know anything about them or what they’re saying or not. Like, Gilbert Gottfried passed away. I knew Gilbert. I had known him since the 90s. A long time. And there’s a photograph that Jeff Ross, the comedian, posted on Instagram. It’s Gilbert, Bob Saget, who is a dear friend, and Norm McDonald, who I also knew very well.

And the four of them are sitting at a table. And Jeff posted this picture, and I said — I wrote on the thing. I said, the lesson here is, don’t eat with Jeff Ross. Now I know that every one of those guys would have thought that was very, very funny.

Yeah, yeah.

But, oh, my goodness, it gets out in the world. And people that don’t get it or whatever, it’s — most people thought it was funny. But a lot of people are like, oh, that’s disrespectful, and you’re disgusting, and how dare you. And et cetera, et cetera. Meanwhile, I know these guys, and you don’t. So I’ll decide what they would think was funny and what wasn’t.

That is funny. Sorry, that’s funny.

I was reading this article about Peter Dinklage, and he —

The Snow White, right?

Yeah, the Snow White. And he was upset, because whatever — why he was upset —

Can you explain who Peter Dinklage is?

Peter Dinklage from Game of Thrones. He’s an actor. He’s a little person. He’s super talented. He is somebody who seemingly goes out of his way to play a variety of roles, roles that anyone could play, no matter what their height was. And he was concerned about “Snow White and the Seven Dwarves” becoming a live action film. And so he spoke about it. He went to Disney, and they said — I don’t know if it was their plan all along or they changed it. Because of him, they said, oh, well, these are going to be magical digital creatures. This is not going to — presumably, that made him feel better about the whole thing.

But then there was the group of little people who were very, very upset that, in their mind, they may have cost them seven acting jobs. And that’s a real thing, too. And so, it was like, if you try to — you can’t even play it down the middle. It’s just like, the only solution is to be completely silent all the time.

Yeah. Well, it didn’t work for Disney in Florida, correct? Like the “Don’t Say Gay” bill.

Yeah, well, that didn’t — yeah, that definitely did — well, I think maybe silence would have been better, because it seems to have worked for a lot of big companies who are not in their crosshairs.

Right.

Their C.E.O.s said nothing about it, which was probably the smarter thing to do from a business standpoint. But yeah, that wasn’t received well. And —

Yeah. We’re not going to do much, but then now they’re doing much, and then the Republicans are seizing upon that.

Yeah, exactly. And you know, I guess the only thing you could do in that situation is the right thing. And we all know what the right thing is.

Right. OK, so let’s talk through some cancelations that have happened. Tell me what you think. A lot of them are comics. Louis C.K.

Yeah. Well, I’m smart enough to not get into the, I’m going to weigh in on every comic and whether they got canceled or not, so I’m going to pass on this line of questioning. Because I know how clickbait works.

I got it. I’m not trying to do clickbait.

I know you’re not, but once it gets out of your hands, it becomes —

Yeah, well, so I guess Kevin Hart is a —

Yeah. No, I just, I feel like if you weigh in on one, you got to weigh in on all of them.

Kathy Griffin?

Well, I mean, listen, when I could say I’ve spoken about Kathy Griffin before. I think it’s crazy what happened to her. And I think she’s a very gentle person no matter what her comedy is like. And I think that what happened to her was unfortunate. But at that time, and I told her this, I said you’re going to get past this. This is not going to define you. And I think that is correct. And I think in like 18 months’ time, it won’t even be a topic when people think of Kathy Griffin.

Sadly, not so.

I mean 18 months from now, though.

Oh, 18 months from now.

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

I think it has stuck with her, unfortunately. All right, so who should be canceled, and who hasn’t? Tucker Carlson?

No, I don’t think we should cancel Tucker Carlson. I think that Tucker Carlson is on commercial television. And if you don’t like Tucker Carlson, you should not buy the products that are advertised on his show. And if you feel like writing a letter to those companies, you should write a letter to them. But I don’t think it’s a good idea to shut people up, because I want to know where people are coming from. I want to know what they think. I want to know if they have horrible thoughts. I want to hear them. I want to hear their confessions.

Now, do I believe that Tucker Carlson believes the things he says? I do not. I think he is a phony in every respect. I think he’s an algorithm. I think his audience created him. I think he started out as a fairly down the middle political broadcaster in a cute little bow tie with polka dots on it. And then Jon Stewart handed him his ass, and he had some kind of Lex Luthor moment where he, little by little, figured out what worked for him ratings-wise, which is primarily speaking to senior citizens like they’re kindergarteners and scaring them with garbage.

And we all know that, I mean, the news back to the 60s, scaring people is a good way to get them to tune in. And they trust him in the same way they either still do or used to trust television evangelists. But the difference is that the evangelists take the money directly from their victims. They don’t create a terrifying fantasy world that hurts the whole country and the world as well. I think he’s like the media version of the Sackler family. He’s knowingly producing this deadly opioid of lies that has a devastating effect on the country. But he’s OK with it, because it’s making him rich.

All right. So let him speak, but a toxic waste dump of a person.

I do still really believe strongly in freedom of speech. You know, I do. And I don’t necessarily agree with people being silenced. I don’t think it’s a —

Even if they don’t believe things they’re saying?

Even if they don’t believe the things they’re saying, yeah. I think we have to figure that out and we have to talk about it and point it out.

So what’s the counter solve to that? When you have that — is it comedy? Like you pointed out. People are having a field day this week about his testicle tanning documentary.

Yeah. I’m still trying to figure out whether he’s for or against testicle tanning. I don’t know. I’m not planning to watch his show. I feel like —

Oh, you must.

Trump is definitely pro-testicle tanning. Clearly, this is right up his alley. But I don’t know whether —

He probably learned about it from him, probably.

It’s just such a silly thing.

I love it. I love testicle tanning.

The end of man. This end of man nonsense that’s going around that’s like somehow, our testosterone levels are going down. Which, of course, that has nothing to do with all the chemicals these companies that give so much money to, these Republican candidates, pump into our bodies and our world. That has nothing to do with the testosterone levels being done. It has to do with Mr. Potato Head and um —

AOC.

Whatever — yeah, and AOC, I mean, who they clearly target because she’s young and beautiful and somebody that is attractive in, I guess, a reverse way to their viewers. But —

Yeah, yeah. So speaking of men, I’m not going to ask about Joe Rogan, because you’re not commenting on that, correct?

Yeah, I mean, well, again, I just I don’t necessarily think that anybody should be shut up. I wish people would be — would pay attention to the facts, and I wish people were just consistent.

Right. But Rogan replaced you as co-host of “The Man Show.” People forget back in the day.

Yeah.

What’s your relationship with him now? Were you surprised that he was able to parlay this into this power center?

I don’t know him at all. When I left “The Man Show” — when Adam and I left the man show, the production company that we worked with took over.

This is Adam Carolla.

Yeah. They hired Joe Rogan and Doug Stanhope. We had nothing to do with that, really.

Yeah, so you never met him. So —

I have met him. Yeah, I have met him. And I think he’s a funny guy. And I think that probably, most of what he says is entertaining and fun to listen to. And I just, I know people who trust what he says, and I know that — I personally people who have put themselves in danger because he minimized the importance of vaccines. But I also know that it’s not as black and white as sometimes the media makes it out to be.

I would tend to agree with you. So “The Man Show” was actually obnoxiously misogynist, as I recall. Also very funny. If it wasn’t evident from the title. There was a segment called, I recall, “Wife School,” where wives were trained to better serve their husbands — classes like “Infidelity, He Can and You Can’t.” Do you think a show like that would exist today? Or does it kind of in different ways?

It kind of does in different ways. I think it also would be, if you could get it on any place, it would be a huge hit. Especially now, because I think backlash creates a bigger wave. And —

Where? Where would it go? Just you’d do it on YouTube, or —

Yeah, there are so many platforms you could do it. But I wouldn’t be interested. I mean, we never took that stuff seriously. And if it was seen as taking a stand of some kind, it just seemed — it seemed silly. It seemed silly in the same way that a beer commercial was, or it was — or Al Bundy was on “Married With Children.” I mean, that’s what we were going for. And really, our goal was to make some kind of an American version of “The Benny Hill Show.” It wasn’t a statement of any kind. It was just a specific sketch comedy show with a specific umbrella.

Would you do it today?

Yeah. I mean, obviously, I wouldn’t — I quit that show when we were doing it. We had a moment, Adam Carolla and I, where a very specific moment, I’ll never forget it. We were taking questions at the end of the show. And Adam said, in a derisive way, he said, yeah, I had one of the kids across the street, his dad, he’d say — he was talking about what a jerk the dad was. He said, opinions are like assholes, everyone has one. And the whole audience started laughing.

And we just looked at each other like, we got to get the fuck out of here. This is not — these are not — this is not what we’re looking for.

Yeah.

And we decided to quit the show before I had the talk show.

Yeah.

And. —

You just hated the audience? You just decided, I don’t like this audience?

It wasn’t that we hated them. It was just like we reached a point where we’re not there for the same reasons. And they were — we were on the radio, we were just rolling. We always thought people were getting it in the way we wanted them to get it. But it became clear that a lot of the audience was just there to get drunk and scream at half naked women, you know?

Right.

And we wanted to be funny.

I mean, you clearly evolved beyond that. You’ve had issues with the use of blackface. You impersonated N.B.A. player Karl Malone, Oprah, many celebrities. You apologized for this. What is that like as you evolve and your audience doesn’t? Or vice versa.

Well, I think much of the audience did. I think that many of the people who want me to be what I was don’t know who I was then. Most of the people didn’t know I was married and I had two little kids. They assumed I was this — I don’t even drink that much. I was this drunken lout. Frat guys always how I was described. I have never been in a fraternity. I never had the desire to be in one.

I don’t feel like I was ever doing anything other than playing a character. In the same way I was playing a character on the radio. Just Jimmy the sports guy. The character lived with his mom and was a gambling addict and all of these things that I wasn’t. And I just thought of this stuff in the same way. I’m playing a character here. I’m in this situation. And I never thought of this stuff. And by the way, nor did anyone in my world, nor did anyone at our television network or our radio network or in standards and practice. Wasn’t evaluated in that way. It was just a different time.

So when you think about that idea of changing, is it hard to do so? Is it hard, for example, what makes. — in the case of, say, the blackface or anything you’ve done, what makes a credible apology in 2022?

Well, a credible apology is something that people who — all I care about in situations like those are, am I going to hurt people that I respect? I know what the reality is, is that half of the country — doesn’t matter what I said. I could show up at their door and knock on it and pour my heart out to them, and they would have the same thoughts afterwards. I mean, people are like, oh, you’re full of shit. I mean, there’s so many people to this day who think I was pretend crying about my son. Which is preposterous. I mean, it’s — OK, all right. Well, what are you going to say to that stuff? So you don’t think about those people. You just try to make sure that the people who you may have actually offended or you care about or whatever know who you are. And that’s what — that’s all you can do. The rest is left to the world to decide.

Nonetheless, we still have this sort of late night show hegemony. Or maybe you don’t think that’s the case. It’s all the same type of person. A white guy, essentially. Does that change, or does it just lose power? How do you feel? You’ve probably spent your whole life trying to get to be this, or many comics have wanted to get to where you are. How do you —

Yeah.

What changes, especially as media changes?

Well, one of the thing that changes is that the just construct of a late night television show isn’t as important anymore. It doesn’t have — we had Johnny Carson, and he would get, whatever, 15 million people watching the show at night. Now there are a lot of shows that add up to 15 million people a night. And I think that continues to splinter. And I think that many different people of various genders and races, et cetera, will have shows that are successful and smaller. Not necessarily as big as the shows were 10 years ago, but enough that people watch them and that they can make a living, and that different voices can be heard. I think that that problem is going to be solved by the splintering of television in general.

What does that do to the power of hosts like yourself? What does it do to someone like you?

It diminishes it. But fine, I have no problem with it. I mean, I think it’s important. And I think it’s fun. And I think ultimately, it gives more opportunities for more people. And I think that it’s great.

One of the things that hosts did, I want to end on this, was bring people together in this country. You said Johnny Carson got this massive share. I remember everybody watched it and talked about it the next day. And even S.N.L. was like that, right? Everybody watched it of a certain age and talked about it. It’s still very good show for all the years that’s been at it. And comedy did bring people together. When you think about this country right now, is there no funny for all of us?

I think there is. I think there — it’s never going to be for everyone, because there’s somebody always has a problem with something or it’s just not in their area of interest. But I do think that when you have something like the Spider-Man movie that is funny and just really good, everyone watches it and none of that ugliness. In fact, now that I think about it, Spider-Man is red and blue, isn’t he? But none of that seeps into a movie like that.

But I don’t know how important it is. I don’t necessarily think it’s that important that we’re all watching something at the same time. You know, when I was a kid, the comedians that I respected and worshipped were 20 years older than I am. And now, you’ve got 25-year-old kids watching other 25-year-old kids. And, yeah, it makes sense. It’s human nature. That’s what they want. They want to be with people their own age. They want to listen to people their own age. And now they have that opportunity.

And I’m never going to do this thing where I try to get young people to — where I align myself with TikTok stars to try to get —

You’re not going to — what happens to the TikTok generation, then?

The TikTok generation, there’ll be three of them that continue. I mean, who would ever imagine that the Kardashians would still be a thing 20 years ago? There’ll be three of them that transcend and move on to other things. And the rest of them will, I don’t know, be Nick and Jessica or something. I don’t know.

They have a new show. So — Nick does, for sure.

Bad example.

How do you remain relevant as a comedy voice? You have to keep doing these Marjorie Taylor Greene things, these TikToks. Whether it’s — like on TikTok, it’s either air fryers or whatever the heck — that’s one of my favorite things to watch. How do you stay relevant today as you think about moving forward?

I suppose I should think about that more. I never do think about it. It’s not something I think about. I have a job in which I have to comment on the news of the day every night. So that keeps me on top of what’s going on and commenting on what’s going on. And there’s always an appetite for that outside the show. The talk show host said this about this. You see it every morning.

But you know who I really get a kick out of and who I think does it in a way that I would want to do it when this is all over with, is Will Ferrell. Because you know, Will Ferrell, besides making movies and making T.V. shows and being great in just about everything, he will pop up working security at a Lakers game. Or you just suddenly see him in some weird situation that he went to great lengths to put himself in that’s just funny for — it’s not for profit. It’s not for anything other than, this would be funny. And I guess I’ll just look for those situations.

But I’m not that worried about being relevant or any of those things. I never imagined myself as the host of a talk show. I’ve far exceeded any expectations I had for myself. I’ve always thought of myself as more of a writer and a producer and the behind the scenes person. I’m generally uncomfortable in the spotlight. You could probably see it in my body language when I walk out. A monologue takes every fiber of my being just to not to crawl into a little ball. I don’t love being the center of attention, and I’m going to be perfectly OK with not being that.

Well, I think Marjorie Taylor Greene has some other plans for you.

Yeah, well, my goal is to wind up in a cell with her somewhere.

Now that is a comedy show. There you have it. Oh my goodness. I can’t wait till you meet her and that happens. I would watch that.

I have a feeling I never will, you know? I feel like I won’t. You think so?

It’s inevitable. Anyway, Jimmy, thank you so much. This is great. I really appreciate it. I do love your show.

Fun talking to you.

And I really look forward to your Marjorie Taylor Greene reality show with you and her together in a cell.

Yeah. Well, you know what? I think we need to put her in a house with Flavor Flav.

It could happen. You know she’s going to be on “Dancing With the Stars” at some point.

No, no. I will make sure that doesn’t happen.

You can’t stop it. Sean Spicer did it. That’s where she’s headed. And it’ll be her v Matt Gaetz, and that’ll be great.

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“Sway” is a production of New York Times Opinion. It’s produced by Nayeema Raza, Blakeney Schick, Daphne Chen, Caitlin O’Keefe and Wyatt Orme. With original music by Isaac Jones, mixing by Sonia Herrero and Carole Sabouraud. And fact checking by Kate Sinclair and Mary Marge Locker. Special thanks to Shannon Busta, Kristin Lin and Kristina Samulewski. The senior editor of “Sway” is Nayeema Raza. And the executive producer of New York Times Opinion Audio is Irene Noguchi.

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