ML - Vegas Magazine

2013 - Issue 6 - October

Vegas Magazine - Niche Media - There is a place beyond the crowds, beyond the ropes, where dreams are realized and success is celebrated. You are invited.

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J immy Kimmel's talk show goes into a commercial break, but that doesn't mean rest for the busy host. The audience applauds vigorously, obeying the command of the illuminated APPLAUSE sign hanging high in the cozy ABC studio. Buoyed by the clapping of these 200 or so fans, Kimmel pushes his chair free of his desk and walks toward the crowd. "Who traveled the furthest distance to be here?" calls out the man who is just a few weeks away from some important travel of his own: his long-awaited Italian honeymoon with writer Molly McNearney. Someone shouts, "Australia!" Another, "Canada!" Then, from the back row, a trio of young women set the stage for a revealing exchange when they respond, "Singapore! Singapore!" The host of Jimmy Kimmel Live grins and peers into the recesses of the theater. "Singapore?" he says. "And you're here to see the show?" "We are students," one of them says, adding that they've been on a West Coast tour of sorts. "We've been to Seattle, San Francisco, and here." She says the three will attend UCLA in the fall. "You know," Kimmel says, "your English is very good." The women point out that English is an official language of their country. "No, it isn't," the host says, smirking. "That's not true." The women are insistent. But like a poker player trying to bluff his way through a crappy hand, the Vegas-bred Kimmel projects an unshakable confidence that he's right. When told that he isn't, he finally concedes. "Well, whatever the case, you speak English very well, better than most Americans." Watching Kimmel arrive at this point—agreeing to disagree on an inarguable fact—you detect the aloof, cocky yet playful air of the Rat Pack. He is certainly dressed for the part, wearing a smart slate-gray suit and rose-colored tie. He's a more svelte, more adult version of the mischievous, wiseacre kid who made his TV debut in the late 1990s as the sidekick of droning smart guy Ben Stein on Win Ben Stein's Money. The 45-year-old Kimmel is aging with an air of comic dignity, always cool but primed to crack wise on any subject, including the official languages of Singapore. He is doubtless a product of his environment, having grown up in Las Vegas—a proud graduate of Ed W. Clark High School, which this year thanked him for his generous donation by naming a technology wing after him—and having attended UNLV, where he became an avid Rebels fan, later appearing in HBO's Jerry Tarkanian documentary and often tweeting his support. Kimmel maintains his finely honed sense of humor when describing his hometown to skeptics who wonder whether he's joking when he claims to be from Vegas: "It seems like it never occurred to people that kids grew up in Las Vegas, that it's not a town exclusively full of magicians and black- jack dealers. Of course, the more I describe it as a normal experience, the more I realize it was an abnormal experience." For instance, there was the time Kimmel saw Sammy Davis Jr.—two memorable times, actually, and they couldn't have been more different. "My bandleader, Cleto [Escobedo III], his dad was Sammy Davis's, like, personal room-service butler," Kimmel says. "So he took us to the show at Caesars, and Sammy was just great. I mean, I was 14 years old, I think, and it was the first concert I'd ever been to. It's a pretty great answer when people ask you what the first concert you ever saw was and you can say, 'Sammy Davis Jr.' We met him afterwards, and he was very nice to us." His other brush with the Sam Man? "I also saw Sammy once shopping for pants in the boys section of Saks Fifth Avenue," Kimmel says, chuckling. "That's a true story." Kimmel bumped into another Vegas entertainment legend at the most commonplace of meeting spots: the grocery store. "I saw Liberace at the Mayfair Market on the Strip," he says. "He was wearing a hairnet and buying meat. It was very sanitary. I said, 'Hey! Liberace!' He smiled, and that was pretty much the end of it." In Vegas, Kimmel was at once surrounded by and fascinated by newsmakers of every ilk. At UNLV, his gig at the campus radio station, a burgeoning FM outlet with the call letters KUNV, was more or less a fluke. "I was working at [the clothing store] Miller's Outpost, and I worked with a kid who was working at the radio station," he says. "He invited me to come meet the program director. I had a little interview with him, and he asked me what I wanted to do. I said, 'You know, I'd like to invite local celebrities to be on the show and make fun of them.'" Those interviews were a harbinger of Kimmel's future job as a late-night talk show host. "I would go through the yellow pages and watch local TV commercials," he says of his search for subjects. "I probably only did six or seven shows before they had enough of me." Even more than his love for the Rebels, it was Kimmel's first foray into interviewing celebrities—or at least people with some local claim to fame— that began his career-long affiliation with UNLV. He even gave the school's commencement address in May. Kimmel spent just one year at the university before transferring to Arizona State in Tempe, although he didn't graduate from either college. (UNLV awarded him an honorary doctorate at his commencement appearance.) Instead, he chased a series of radio jobs in Phoenix, Seattle, Tampa, Palm Springs, and Tucson, before landing at KROQ-FM in Los Angeles. In LA, Kimmel spent five years as Jimmy the Sports Guy on the "Kevin & Bean" morning radio show. As part of his role, he once agreed to participate in what turned out to be a career-changing charity boxing match against a combatant named Michael the Maintenance Man. A listener who happened to be working as a boxing coach offered to train one of the fighters for the big bout. " Vegas gets a bad rap, but I think that's part of the deal when you have a city that's named itself Sin City."—JIMMY KIMMEL Suit ($2,990), slim fit shirt ($355), tie ($190), and Varenne wash shoes ($650), Gucci. The Forum Shops at Caesars, 702-369-7333; gucci.com. Belt, Prada ($450). Bellagio, 702-866-6886; prada.com 310-652-1313. Cindy mercury satin heels, Stuart Weitzman ($595). The Forum Shops at Caesars, 702-369-9222; stuartweitzman.com Dress, Zuhair Murad ($7,532). Neiman Marcus, Fashion Show, 702-731-3636; neimanmarcus.com. South Sea pearl earrings ($5,400) and pearl and sterling fringe bracelet ($395), Samira 13. Available exclusively at Samira 13, SEE ABOVE. ON ALDEN (LEFT): Dress, Naeem Khan ($3,990). By special order, Neiman Marcus, Pearl strand necklace ($360) and tassel pearl bracelet ($550), Miriam Haskell. miriamhaskell.com. April gold sugar heels, Brian Atwood ($1,495). Saks Fifth Avenue, Fashion Show, 702-733-8300; saks.com ON NICOLE (RIGHT): VEGASMAGAZINE.COM 95 092-097_V_F_CoverStory_Jimmy_Oct13.indd 95 9/18/13 12:40 PM

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