Jimmy Kimmel is taking a break following the death of his friend and bandleader Cleto Escobedo III, otherwise known as Jr.
Jimmy Kimmel Live! will take the rest of the week off. It comes after Kimmel paid a moving tribute to his friend, who he has known since childhood.
“Cherish your friends, we are not here forever,” he concluded his monologue. “Thanks for making me happy, we’re going to take the next two nights off, I wanted to be here tonight to tell you about my friend and Cleto loved Eddie Murphy and he wouldn’t have wanted us to miss this.”
Kimmel’s guests tonight included Murphy, who was promoting his Being Eddie doc for Netflix and Morgan Fairchild.
The break will see the show reschedule the next guests; Danny DeVito, Howard Jones, Debbie Gibson were scheduled to appear on Wednesday’s show and Jason Bateman, Mr. T and Susanna Hoffs were scheduled to appear on Thursday’s show.
Kimmel opened the show by saying, “We’ve been on the air for almost 23 years and I’ve had to do some tough monologues along the way,” he said. “But it’s okay… This one is the hardest because late last night, early this morning, we lost someone very special who was too young to go.”
He also recalled that they were both fans of David Letterman and that it was “a really big deal for both of us” when he first appeared in 1999.
The comedian called Escobedo a child prodigy, praising him for his saxophone playing skills and highlighted his work with Paula Abdul.
