Late-night TV comedian Jimmy Kimmel says it was too much Advil, not pride or fame, that went to his head as his face puffed up like a balloon on Wednesday night during the course of his show.
The 36-year-old host of ABC’s “Jimmy Kimmel Live,” which is actually taped an hour before air time each week night, visited a local emergency room immediately after the show and was treated for what was an apparent allergic reaction.
“My face is still a bit puffy, but I’ll be back to work tonight,” he said in a statement issued Thursday.
According to an ABC spokeswoman, Kimmel began feeling ill as the taping began but pressed on through the entire hour-long show as his face grew progressively more puffy, his eyes swelled shut and his voice turned hoarse.
The comedian also broke out in a rash, his spokesman said, adding that Kimmel believed he was stricken by a reaction to Advil, a nonprescription brand painkiller containing ibuprofen that he was taking for a sore back.
“I know this sounds like one of Courtney Love’s stories,” Kimmel said, alluding to the drug possession case pending against the grunge rocker, “but I took about eight Advil during the day yesterday — about five too many — and my head blew up like a float in the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade.”