'Barbie' Is the Reason Jimmy Kimmel Is Hosting the Oscars a Fourth Time

Barbie was the highest-grossing film in 2023, pulling in a whopping $1,441,820,453. It was making a cultural impact before it was even released. Photos and trailers were memed and shared ad nauseam. It felt like the first movie in some time that everyone wanted to see. Then, not only did people watch it, they mostly loved it. It became a point of conversation you could use with your 12-year-old niece and 70-year-old grandfather. One person who noticed the film’s cultural impact was Jimmy Kimmel.

Kimmel will be returning to host the Oscars for the fourth time this year. In a recent sitdown with the LA Times, he reviewed his decision to return. As he quickly points out, the hosting gig is not easy. He should know. He was doing it the year of the great LaLa Land/Moonlight debacle. It was made even worse because Kimmel felt no one had seen Moonlight. Kimmel told the Times, “I made a joke about ‘Moonlight’ that made it clear to me that the vast majority of the room had not seen the movie, even though it won best picture.”

As Kimmel details in the interview, he prefers a shorthand or connection to the audience if he’s going to host. He mentions one of his earliest hosting gigs, at the age of 15, where he got to host a flea market at his local church. There was a shorthand. He could make fun of his priest, Father Bill, and most people would get it. Last year, he returned to hosting because he thought everyone saw Top Gun: Maverick (I didn’t, but I also haven’t seen the original). This year, the film that felt like a bridge to his audience is Barbie.

Kimmel feels more comfortable with returning, but that doesn’t mean it will be without controversy. He reflected on several jokes from last year’s ceremony that still found him in hot water. Not all of the jokes are going to land, but Kimmel has found peace with that, saying, “There’s nothing you could do about that, unfortunately, but it happens. It’s just something that you have to accept. Last year, I said something about Irish people drinking — my dad is Irish, this is not something I imagined would come off as racist, but to certain people, it did. I tried that joke out 40 different times with 40 different people, and no one ever raised that red flag.”

The whole piece is worth reading. Kimmel is affable and self-effacing. He talks about his eventual retirement. He reflects on the year his son needed open-heart surgery. It spurred a change in Kimmel’s style, but he only thinks of it in terms of his family. It’s a stunning read and honestly makes me even more excited for him to host the Oscars again.