Jimmy Kimmel was all over the headlines earlier this fall in the 2025 TV schedule for the unfortunate reason that his ABC late night talk show had been suspended indefinitely. Fortunately, it was only a matter of time before Jimmy Kimmel Live! returned to late night, with his first episode back beating his own ratings record. More recently, however, an episode was unexpectedly cancelled, but there’s good news to reassure anybody who might be nervous that the end is nigh (again).
When ABC Didn’t Air Jimmy Kimmel Live!
The intended new episode was planned for Thursday, November 6, with TV Insider reporting that the planned guests included Malice‘s David Duchovny, Stranger Things‘ Joe Keery, and Madison Beer, the latter of whom was expected to perform as musical guest. No official reason has been given from Jimmy Kimmel, ABC, or a representative of the show at the time of writing.
That said, LateNighter claims that the November 6 episode was cancelled due to a personal matter, and an unverified email alleged to be from the Jimmy Kimmel Live! audience team (via the Jimmy Kimmel Reddit forum) issued “apologies for any inconvenience.” It remains to be seen if an official explanation will be provided to confirm or debunk these claims.
Still, it’s not all bad news, even if you were counting on seeing Duchovny, Keery, and Beer on late night on November 6 (not least because Keery was presumably scheduled to appear live on Kimmel shortly after Netflix’s Stranger Things Season 5 world premiere event).
The Good News Despite The Cancellation
For one, both the unverified alleged email from Reddit and the LateNighter claim state that the episode has simply been postponed, and ABC ran a repeat of Jimmy Kimmel Live! on Thursday night instead of replacing it with another program. As fans may remember, Sinclair planned on preempting the show during the suspension. Plus, Madison Beers went on the record about her planned appearance on the show, posting this as an Instagram Story:
While she didn’t drop any details about the cancellation beyond attributing it to “unforeseen circumstances,” her message is that her performance is being rescheduled “to a later date.” The show evidently isn’t intending on scrapping the entire episode. While only time will tell if David Duchovny and Joe Keery will be able to reschedule as well, the cancellation currently doesn’t seem to have anything to do with larger problems with the show, and this shouldn’t be taken as a sign to panic that Kimmel is in trouble with execs.
The episode listed on ABC’s schedule for November 7 is another rerun, this time of the episode that aired on November 4 and featured a number of players from the 2025 World Series-winning Dodgers, as well as Josh Brolin and Elizabeth Olsen. A rerun on a Friday night isn’t unusual, however, and there’s currently no indication that Jimmy Kimmel won’t be back in his usual weeknight late night time slot on Monday, November 10. If you want to revisit other episodes of the current season of Jimmy Kimmel Live!, you can do so streaming with a Hulu subscription.