Recently, I have begun to take advantage of the fact that I attend school in Los Angeles. What do I mean when I say take advantage? Well, for many of you that are unaware, LA serves as the television and film capital of the world; and a lot of the time, these larger production companies reach out to the public in order to help them create what you see on screen. This is especially true for television, specifically game shows and talk shows. Recently having been to America's Got Talent and The Ellen DeGeneres show, I thought I would push my luck even more and see if I could be an audience member for one of my favorite late night shows, Jimmy Kimmel Live!
The process of requesting tickets is actually very easy. All I did was look up "Jimmy Kimmel tickets" on Google, and it took me to a site called 1iota. On the site, I viewed and requested dates that I wanted to potentially attend the show. After making an account and requesting tickets for multiple, multiple tapings, I had to write a little paragraph about why I loved Jimmy. This wasn't very hard at all, especially since Jimmy is a native Las Vegan (like myself) and that I have been watching him with my family since I was about 11 years old. I'm pretty sure they do this so they can pick the most enthusiastic people to be audience members. After all of that (which took me only about ten minutes), the company emailed me and said that I was placed on a waitlist for tickets. This didn't mean that I would get them, but I was pretty hopeful.
About two days later the company emailed me saying that I received two priority tickets for a taping the following week. And for free too. I was super ecstatic.
They emailed me a long list of important information, including check-in time and location and what to wear. On the day of the taping, I wore a casual dress and a nice jacket. They described the dress code as nice casual, "as if you were going to a nice dinner," in their words. And they made sure to mention not to wear any dull colors, such as black and white. For priority ticket holders check-in began at 3:15 and ended at 3:45. The check-in location is right on Hollywood Boulevard, and adjacent to a building owned by TMZ. As my friend and I were walking there, we ooed and awed over all of the stars on the Hollywood Walk of Fame (yes we had to stop and take a picture of Paul Rudd's star). Overall, check-in was really easy. We just showed a crew member our tickets, and they gave us a green wristband. We waited about thirty minutes before we were escorted to the studio. We went through security, and at that point all of our phones needed to be shut off. They obviously don't want people taking pictures or videos of the taping.
The studio was amazing. We walked in and what everyone immediately thought was how much smaller it looked in real life than it did on TV. This is because it was true. It looks so small, it's crazy what lighting and spacing can do. We were then escorted to our seats by a crew member. While we waited for the show to start, they played clips from past shows to keep us entertained. Finally, a crew member named Link greeted us and sort of "hyped us up" for the show. He wanted us to be super energetic and excited because that's what network television loves. It wasn't really hard for anyone to be excited since we already were. Then, Link introduced Don, the audience heckler. He was extremely funny and was basically just warming the audience up for Jimmy. He
THEN, THE BEST MOMENT OF MY LIFE HAPPENED.
The star of the show, Guillermo himself, walked out and said hello to us. He was fantastic, the absolute best. He wasn't really on for that long, but it was still awesome.
Finally, after about forty-five minutes in the studio, the show was about to start. The band started playing and the announcer announced Jimmy. He walked out on stage and everyone went crazy! He gave about a 10-minute long monologue, in which he made jokes about the Met Gala, Trump, Mother's Day and Teacher Appreciation Day. Some pre-made videos played, including a wonderful, amazing, fantastic video of George Clooney about things such as climate change and vaccinations.
After the monologue, we went to a commercial break. Then, Jimmy actually talked to the audience during the break. It was incredibly cool to see, considering I thought he would just talk to producers and prepare for what was next. But that was actually not the case. He managed to have an entire conversation with an Australian woman who owns a balloon business and even pointed out how there is a growing shortage of helium. He thanked the audience for coming and told everyone that we were going to have a great show.
The rest of the show went pretty fast but was still just as fun. George Clooney came out to promote his new Hulu series Catch 22 (and yes, he is as dreamy as you thought). Then, Jimmy interviewed Dr. Oz, and they had an entire conversation about how hallucinogens such as magic mushrooms and LSD are being researched by scientists as medication for addiction. After the interviews, we were escorted to another part of the studio, and we were treated to a performance by musician, Pink Sweat$, who was amazing.
Afterward, the show was over and we were allowed to leave the building.
If you ever have the chance to attend Jimmy Kimmel Live!, I highly recommend you do. Overall, it was just an extremely fun experience. And I've already requested tickets for later tapings.
