Wednesday may have been Jimmy Kimmel‘s 57th birthday, but the comic took a selfless approach to the day, much to his audience’s delight.
The Jimmy Kimmel Live! host copped to it being his birthday at the end of last night’s monologue, which was met with enthusiastic applause. “Honestly, I was wondering if you were going to say anything,” Kimmel joked. “And since I didn’t get what I wanted last Tuesday, I made another wish.”
Kimmel—with a noticeable gleam in his eye—went on to explain how Los Angeles is home to the robo-taxi company Waymo, which employs a fleet of self-driving Jaguar I-PACEs. After recently being stopped beside one of these vehicles at a traffic light, and seeing how strange it looked to have no driver behind the wheel, Kimmel decided “it [would] be fun to have my Aunt Chippy picked up in one of these, and then have it drive off with her in the backseat. She doesn’t know about driverless cars—she’s 85.”
So with the help of Kimmel’s cousin Micki (Chippy’s daughter) and his cousin Sal (a.k.a. “Cousin Sal,” a writer on the show), the Jimmy Kimmel Live! host hired an actor to portray a driver coming to pick Chippy up… only for it to take off without him.
Fans of Jimmy Kimmel Live! undoubtedly know what came next: Aunt Chippy pretty much lost her sh*t, and let a stream of expletives fly.
It started out PG-rated enough with a series of “Oh my God!”s screamed in quick succession and at high volume. But surprise quickly turned to annoyance (“You dirty bastard! You want me to die!”) and abject terror (“Stay in the car for my safety?! I want to get the f**k out of here!”).
Cousin Micki got in on the hijinks when she pretended to be the voice of Waymo. After introducing herself (as “Waymo”), Micki asked Chippy her name. She responded: “Your ass.”
When she was offered the chance to call a friend or family member, Chippy told Waymo (Micki) to “Get me frickin’ Micki!” But when frickin’ Micki played dumb and pretended not to understand what her mom was telling her, Chippy got dark: “To think I could have ended your life when you were little and I didn’t” (which gave Micki the biggest laugh of all).
Eventually, Chippy commanded Waymo to “Get me over to Jimmy Kimmel Live! I’ll get that little bastard—I’m gonna kill him.”
While Kimmel’s 57th birthday did not end up being his final day on Earth, it’s certainly not a day Aunt Chippy will forget—or forgive—any time soon. You can watch the full clip below.
I’ve seen Jimmy Kimmel prank his aunt many times but this seemed extreme. I found it hard to believe they really put an 85 year old woman in a situation where she would be afraid for her life. It had to be staged.