The future of Jimmy Kimmel’s late night talk show, Jimmy Kimmel Live!, has yet to be revealed.
“I’m not going to make that announcement here with you today,” Disney president and chief creative officer Dana Walden said during a Bloomberg Screentime session on Thursday, October 1, per The Hollywood Reporter.
Kimmel, 58, has hosted Jimmy Kimmel Live! since 2003. Rumors recently swirled that the comedian’s contract wouldn’t be renewed before ABC debunked the speculation. Other reports have claimed that the network was seeking significant budget cuts in order to keep the show on the air.
“The truth is, it’s a very challenging daypart,” Walden added on Thursday. “That’s not to say that Jimmy is not doing a phenomenal job, and his ratings are up. But they’re up relative to a smaller audience that’s watching late night on broadcast television.”
While Walden acknowledged that Kimmel’s show has success on YouTube and social media, those views and clicks don’t amount to the same revenue as on-air advertising.
“That is not a lucrative opportunity for a very premium talk show,” Walden added. “We’re trying to make sense of the business while also honoring a deep partnership. I love Jimmy; we have great friendship. He’s close to a number of the people at Disney.”
She continued, “We’re trying to work through it and make sense of what does Jimmy want, what’s the right thing to do and what’s the right thing for our business.”
Kimmel’s show was pulled from the air in September 2025 after the longtime host made controversial comments about the late Charlie Kirk in his opening monologue.
“I have five people who work in my office with me, so the only private place to go is the bathroom. So, I go into the bathroom, and I’m on the phone with the ABC executives, and they say, ‘Listen, we want to take the temperature down. We’re concerned about what you’re going to say tonight, and we decided the best route is to take the show off the air,’” he recalled on The Late Show at the time. “I said, ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea,’ and they said, ‘Well, we think it’s a good idea.’ And then there was a vote and I lost the vote.”
He continued, “I thought, ‘That’s it. It’s over. It is over.’ I was like, ‘This is never coming back on the air.’ That’s really what I thought.”
Jimmy Kimmel Live! returned six days later, with ABC also renewing Live! for another year.
