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Kimmel Says ‘Man Show’ Ended Because Audience Was Dumb And Liked Boobs

REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

Betsy Rothstein Gossip blogger
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ABC Late-night host Jimmy Kimmel reflects on his “Man Show” radio program with ease no matter that Fox News host Sean Hannity used his time there to nickname him Harvey Weinstein, Jr.

In a lengthy interview with The Daily Beast, Kimmel says the show he co-hosted with Adam Carolla basically ended because the audience was too dumb. The program aired on Comedy Central between 1999 and 2004.

But maybe it hasn’t aged so well?

Maxim described the show as “a half-hour of sophomoric debauchery devoted to beer, boobs and stupid pranks.” A regular segment involved attractive women jumping on trampolines. It was called: “Girls on Trampolines.” The point was that the women jumped and their breasts jiggled. Another segment had Kimmel out on Sunset Boulevard asking women to guess what was in his pants. In one instance, he suggested that a woman put her mouth on it to make it “easier” to guess.

The Kimmel-Hannity feud dates back to April. Hannity flipped out when Kimmel mocked first lady Melania Trump’s accent when she read a book to schoolchildren at the White House Easter Roll. Hannity called Kimmel an “no-talent ass clown.” Kimmel retorted with cracks on Hannity’s inability to get an erection during former President Obama‘s presidency and his apparent fixation with birds up the butt.

Asked if he thought about “The Man Show” differently now in view Hannity’s attacks on him, Kimmel told The Daily Beast that “the show was always tongue in cheek.”

Kimmel said some listeners “enjoyed it for the wrong reasons.”

Oh really, like what?

“The reason we left that show was because there was a specific day on which Adam [Carolla] and I looked at each other and said, ‘It’s time to end this show.’ Adam was talking about the dad of one of his friends. And he was talking about what an idiot this guy was. This guy would say, ‘Opinions are like assholes, everyone has one.’ And Adam said that intending to illustrate how dumb this guy was and instead our studio audience laughed.”

The interviewer asked, “Like they’d never heard that joke before?”

Kimmel replied, “They’d never heard that joke before, if it is even a joke. And that was disheartening. And that’s when we decided to stop doing the show.”

A stinging part of the interview involved NBC “TODAY” Show host Megyn Kelly, who has been repeatedly dogged in the media for her ratings and the awkward rollout of her new daytime talk program. The interviewer raised the suggestion that Kelly recently made that maybe if late-night  hosts didn’t hate Republicans, their ratings would improve.

Kimmel pulled out a verbal butcher knife: “Isn’t it funny to hear someone like Megyn Kelly, who based on her ratings probably won’t make it to the end of the year on NBC, talking about anyone else’s ratings?”

Not so fast? On Monday, New York Post‘s Page Six reported that viewership of Kelly program was up a whole 1 percent since last year.