It’s finally here! Jimmy Kimmel didn’t disappoint as he kicked off the 2017 Oscars at the Dolby Theatre in Hollywood on Sunday, February 26. Watch the video above and stay tuned to Us Weekly’s live blog here.
The Jimmy Kimmel Live! host, 49, took the stage after Justin Timberlake sang his Trolls hit “Can’t Stop the Feeling!” which is nominated for Best Original Song.
“Oh, good, I got a sitting ovation,” he quipped. He then missed the microphone that Timberlake threw, and teased: “I really hope the other guys from ‘NSync are watching [Timberlake] … because if they are, I think there’s a really good chance they will invite you back in the band.”
Kimmel dipped into politics next, but started off on a positive note. “There are millions of people watching right now and if every one of you took a minute to reach out to one person you disagree with, someone you like, and have a positive, considerate conversation, not as liberals or conservatives, but as Americans, if we would all do that, we would make America great again,” he said. “We really could. It starts with us.”
He went on to joke about President Donald Trump’s past remarks that Meryl Streep is just a “mediocre” actress. The mogul, 70, tweeted the comment after Streep, 67, spoke out against him while accepting the Cecil B. DeMille Award at the Golden Globes in January.
“And of all the great actors here in Hollywood, one in familiar has stood the test of time for her many uninspiring and overrated performances,” Kimmel said. “Everybody, please join me in giving her a totally undeserved round of applause, will you? The highly overrated Meryl Streep, everyone. We’re going to have fun tonight. I hope we’re going to have fun tonight. Nice dress, by the way, [Meryl]. Is that an Ivanka [Trump]?” (Earlier this month, POTUS called out Nordstrom when the company dropped his daughter’s clothing line.)
Kimmel made sure to get a couple of jabs in against his frenemy Matt Damon too. “Tonight, in the spirit of healing and bringing people together, I’d like to bury the hatchet with someone I’ve had issues with — Matt Damon,” he said. “When I first met Matt, I was the fat one, truth. We have problems, he’s a selfish person.”
The pals have had an ongoing fake feud since December 2005, when Kimmel jokingly ended one of his shows by saying, “I want to apologize to Matt Damon. We ran out of time.” More recently, Damon poked fun at Kimmel’s Oscar hosting gig during an appearance on The Ellen DeGeneres Show. “I mean, it’s terrible for everybody. Sorry, I’m just being honest. I have extremely low expectations for his performance on Oscar night,” he said on February 16.
On Sunday night, just an hour before taking the stage, Kimmel posted a photo of himself taking notes while watching Damon outside Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre. “Dead man walking the red carpet #Oscars,” he captioned the Instagram pic.
Earlier this month, Kimmel opened up about emceeing the big night during an interview with CNN. “It’s something I was hoping to be asked to do, but I didn’t necessarily ever want to do it. I know all the baggage that comes along with it and the work that comes along with it, and also the criticism that inevitably also comes along with it. I wanted to do it but I’ve also feared doing it — and I still fear doing it,” he said at the time. “You could look at it as a risk or you could look at it another way. Let’s say it goes great, and then they ask me to do it again, then it has to be great again. There’s no end to this. You keep doing it until you fail. There has to be an endgame of some kind where I emerge victorious.”
The late-night host also hinted that he would crack some jokes about the commander in chief. “You want to talk about what other people are talking about, and [politics] is definitely what people are talking about right now,” he said. “[But] it won’t make up the entirety.”
Read more of Kimmel’s best monologue jokes below.
“Black people saved NASA [in Hidden Figures] and white people saved jazz [in La La Land]. That’s what you call progress.”
“Manchester by the Sea, that was a fun film, wasn’t it?”
“Of all the nominees, the only happy ending was in the middle of Moonlight. You didn’t watch it, did you?”
“Maybe this is not a popular thing to say, but I want to say thank you to President Trump. Remember last year when it seemed like the Oscars were racist?”
“There’s only one Braveheart in this room, and he’s not going to unite us, either, OK? Mel [Gibson], you look great. I think the Scientology is working.”
“Jeff Bridges is here. Did you bring your vape pen?”
“If there’s anyone here from CNN or the Los Angeles Times or The New York Times, if you work for anything with the word Times in it, I would like you to leave the building right now, OK? We have no tolerance for fake news. Fake tans we love, but [no] fake news.”
“This is the part of the show when everyone still has hope before people start losing and you realize you taped your dress to your boobs for nothing.”
“Viola Davis just got nominated for an Emmy for that speech.”
“Lin-Manuel Miranda, it is weird to see you in a theater without having to pay $10,000.”
“Two hours into the show and Donald Trump hasn’t tweeted at us once. And I’m starting to get worried about him.”
“Almost midway through the broadcast, the crowd turned on Kimmel. With an absolutely tasteless joke about our beloved O.J.”
