Jimmy Kimmel’s Wife Reflects on “Sneaking” Around During Early Dating Stage While He Was Her Boss
Jimmy Kimmel’s Wife Reflects on “Sneaking” Around During Early Dating Stage While He Was Her Boss
Hannah MalachMon, August 24, 2026 at 7:29 PM UTC
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Jimmy Kimmel and Molly McNearney on May 31, 2026.Credit: Getty ImagesThe Gist -
Jimmy Kimmel and his wife Molly McNearney appeared together in the latest episode of Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast.
McNearney explained that she met Kimmel while working on his eponymous talk show.
“I remember thinking, ‘Oh, no. This is a bad idea.’ He was my boss,” she said.
Jimmy Kimmel’s wife Molly McNearney looked back on the early stages of their romance in a new interview. The producer, 48, married Kimmel over a decade ago, and they now share two children, but she initially thought getting into a relationship with him was “a terrible idea.”
Appearing alongside Kimmel on Dax Shepard’s “Armchair Expert” podcast on August 24, McNearney explained how she met the comedian while working on Jimmy Kimmel Live! She recalled a staff meeting where someone asked about everyone’s five favorite foods, and McNearney “rattled off pizza and gnocchi, crab claws, BLT and chocolate chip cookies,” which Kimmel would end up preparing for her months later.
Jimmy Kimmel and Molly McNearney in 2024.Credit: Kevin Mazur/Getty
“Talk about a long play,” McNearney said. “I go to Jimmy’s house, he asks me to come over after work...and he opens up the door and it smells delicious and he’s like, ‘I made some things,’ and it was pizza and gnocchi, crab claws, chocolate chip cookies and BLT.”
“Do you immediately register that as like, ‘Oh, he wants to fuck?’” Shepard asked.
“It made me very excited and very nervous,” McNearney replied. “I remember thinking, ‘Oh, no. This is a bad idea.’ He was my boss.”
Jimmy Kimmel, Molly McNearney, and their kids in 2018.Credit: Jesse Grant/Getty Images
Kimmel said that he “didn’t have that thought” at the time, to which McNearney responded: “The person in power usually doesn’t, but I was very nervous about it. I thought it was a terrible idea. I was very skittish. I kept telling him, ‘I think this is a bad idea,’ and he kept saying, ‘It’s not a bad idea,’ and now we’ve been together.”
The couple did admit to doing “a little bit” of “sneaking” when they began dating.
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“The first few months, we were very, very quiet,” McNearney shared. “I was very nervous about it changing the work dynamic, and I was in a room of mostly men, and we had a great thing going on...and I didn’t want it to change.”
Jimmy Kimmel and Molly McNearney in 2024.Credit: rederic J. Brown / AFP/ Getty
McNearney also discussed their first meeting, when she was introduced to Kimmel while working as an assistant on Jimmy Kimmel Live! Shepard asked McNearney, who would later become a writer on the show, if she knew then that they would become “a thing.”
“No, not even a little bit, and by the way, same with him with me,” McNearney said. “I did not look at him that way at all.”
After working with him “for years,” McNearney realized that she “really loved this guy.”
“I was like, ‘He is such a good human. He takes such good care of his staff. He’s so good to his family. He’s just a good human being,’” she said.
McNearney and Kimmel married in 2013, welcoming their daughter Jane the following year. They expanded their family in 2017 with the birth of their son, Billy. Kimmel also has a 34-year-old daughter, Katie, and a son Kevin, 32, from his previous marriage to costume designer Gina Kimmel.
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Source: “AOL Entertainment”
