Bill Maher has opened up about a falling out with late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, admitting that a disagreement that jeopardized their friendship late last year has led him to believe the two will never speak again.<\/p>\n
Maher was speaking with his guest, comic Adam Carolla, on his Club Random podcast when the beef with Kimmel came up. Maher has been hosting the loose and spirited one-on-one interview show for Tubi, in addition to his panel series for HBO, Real Time with Bill Maher.<\/p>\n
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\u201cJimmy Kimmel, you know, he\u2019s very mad at me and I know you\u2019re close to him,\u201d Maher told Carolla, who co-hosted The Man Show on Comedy Central with the late-night host from 1999 to 2004. \u201cI hope you tell him that I\u2019m sorry that it got bent out of shape. I don\u2019t think I did anything wrong. We can have disagreements. I mean, you and I don\u2019t agree on everything \u2014 look at this clash now \u2014 and yet we\u2019re cool.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Maher never stated the details about his and Kimmel\u2019s disagreement or what was \u201cbent out of shape,\u201d several outlets have reported<\/a> that the friendship hit the skids when Maher commented on Kimmel\u2019s wife, Molly McNearney<\/a>, who is the co-head writer and the executive producer of Jimmy Kimmel Live! In November, McNearney revealed on the We Can Do Hard Things podcast that she had lost relationships with some family members who supported and voted for President Trump in last year\u2019s election.<\/p>\n \u201cIt hurts me so much because of the personal relationship I now have where my husband is out there fighting this man,\u201d McNearney said on the Nov. 6 episode, referencing the ongoing war of words between Kimmel and Trump. Over the summer, Disney, the parent company of ABC, indefinitely suspended<\/a> Jimmy Kimmel Live!. The show quickly returned after a major backlash ensued.<\/p>\n \u201cTo me, them voting for Trump is them not voting for my husband and me and our family,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd I, unfortunately, have kind of lost relationships with people in my family because of it.\u201d<\/p>\n In December, Maher decided to criticize McNearney on an episode of Real Time.<\/p>\n \u201cShe says she\u2019s lost relationships with relatives because she wrote them an email before the election with 10 reasons why they shouldn\u2019t vote for Trump, and some still didn\u2019t obey \u2014 so, you know, ultimatums. Ten reasons? I can think of 100. But I would never present it to someone as an ultimatum,\u201d Maher told the HBO audience. \u201cUltimatums don\u2019t make people rethink their politics. They make them rethink you.\u201d<\/p>\n Following this moment on Real Time, Maher mentioned on an episode of Club Random that Kimmel and McNearney were angry with him over the comment. He offered an apology at the time that may have been more of a justification of his words than an expression of contrition.<\/p>\n \u201cI was as kid-gloved as I could. And I see they\u2019re mad at me. Uh, I\u2019m sorry. I mean, I was being, again, as respectful as I could, but I don\u2019t agree with that point of view. And since she went public with it, it wasn\u2019t out of school for me to go public with it. I love Jimmy. I\u2019ve always have. I don\u2019t know him that well, but he\u2019s a great guy\u2026 I hope we\u2019re friends forever, but I don\u2019t know. You know, the liberals and the woke \u2014 that\u2019s a schism. It just is.\u201d<\/p>\n Speaking further with Carolla about the matter on his show this week, Maher pointed out that his brand is even-handed in its approach to political jokes \u2014 contrasting Kimmel\u2019s left-leaning humor.<\/p>\n \u201cMy tribe is supposed to be the left, but these are the people who just can\u2019t talk to you unless you\u2019re exactly there, whereas the Republicans, they always \u2026 come to my show,\u201d Maher said. \u201cI don\u2019t just buy into the left-wing nonsense, and I never stop making fun of the right-wing nonsense at all.<\/p>\n \u201cI think he\u2019s a great guy,\u201d Maher added. \u201cAnd it bugs me that \u2014 because of what the latest thing was \u2014 we may never talk again.\u201d<\/p>\n The Hollywood Reporter has reached out to representatives for Kimmel and McNearney for comment but did not hear back from them immediately.<\/p>\n Best of The Hollywood Reporter<\/p>\n Sign up for THR’s Newsletter<\/a>. For the latest news, follow us on Facebook<\/a>, Twitter<\/a>, and Instagram<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Bill Maher has opened up about a falling out with late-night host Jimmy Kimmel, admitting that a disagreement…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277565,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[29],"tags":[155618,8938,156,688,111,139,69,21491,82682,437],"class_list":{"0":"post-277564","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-tv","8":"tag-adam-carolla","9":"tag-bill-maher","10":"tag-entertainment","11":"tag-jimmy-kimmel","12":"tag-new-zealand","13":"tag-newzealand","14":"tag-nz","15":"tag-real-time-with-bill-maher","16":"tag-the-hollywood-reporter","17":"tag-tv"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277564","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277564"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277564\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277565"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277564"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277564"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277564"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}