Jimmy Kimmel and Guillermo Rodriguez tour Toronto ...funniest thing in years!

A buddy of mine sent me the YouTubelink to the five-minute bit that Jimmy Kimmel and sidekick Guillermo Rodriguez did following their Toronto visit during the Film Festival.

They did some TIFF stuff for the show, which I didn't see. (I found a photo of Diaz dressed like a Mountie, however). I was surprised there wasn't something about TIFF in the video they did. That having been said, it's a great video and it puts the city in a pretty good light.

I'd never seen, and this is embarrassing to admit, but I'd never seen Jimmy Kimmel on TV. I wouldn't have recognized him if I'd bumped into him at the library. I'd never even HEARD of Guillermo Rodriguez. But after watching their shtick, I think these guys have the best chemistry I've seen on our streets since Keelor and Cuddy. Or maybe Gillick and Beeston, that famous duo who helped bring a pair of World Series titles to our beloved Blue Rays, as Diaz calls them.

I adore that old, yellow car (a Lincoln, maybe) that Diaz drives, and I love that he speaks into this clunky old p.a. system even when they're a foot away from each other in the car, or when they walk Sugar Beach holding hands, which is a great scene.

I think somehow the city itself, although we don't have a speaking role, comes off as somewhat self-deprecating. Which is great. The streets shine, Lake Ontario sparkles, and the Ontario Tower pokes its head up into a great, wide, blue, Canadian sky, rising over a people blessed with fabulous bacon and fresh syrup.

We learn many things on this wondrous trip. Winston Church Hill was a Canadian who apparently lived from 1974 to 1935. Our baseball team has the same name as a famous style of DVD, the Blue Ray. And our weather is beautiful.

"We should move here," Kimmel (see photo) tells Rodriguez as they wander the streets, avoiding death from sliding left into the path of oncoming streetcars (which also look good on TV; better than in person). "The weather's beautiful."

Rodriguez agrees.

"They have syrup."

"They have the bacon that's better than our bacon," Kimmel replies in a very sweet, not too overly smarmy kind of way (like, say, David Letterman, who I like a lot, would do).

I find the end, when they sing at the Celine Dion star on our horribly cheesy walk of fame, a bit of a letdown. Too easy a target for guys who are this clever. Or maybe I just hate having Toronto saddled with the shadow of someone like Celine Dion, who's vocal stylings are so much posturing and designed far too much to impress, not unlike the yahoos who foul up the national anthems at the Blue Rays games.

(Hey, did anyone else who watched the video catch that weird bit in the middle? They're down at Harbourfront looking at the lake, and Kimmel asks Diaz if they can get out of the car. Diaz says of course, but then the video cuts to a scene of the car travelling NORTH past the Ontario College of Art and Design. Then, suddenly, they're at Sugar Beach near Jarvis and Queen's Quay - the opposite direction. They must've got their directions from a Toronto cabbie. It's a pretty minor thing. Not quite like the scene in The Graduate where Ben (Dustin Hoffman) is travelling the wrong way on the Bay Bridge to get to Berkeley. But kinda the same thing. Well, sorta the same thing.)

Anyway, I can't believe I've never seen these guys before. They're wonderful together. And I love the fact that Rodriguez used to be the parking lot security guard at Kimmel's studio. Some folks might think he's being exploited, but you gotta love the ability of a security guy to rise up so fast so quickly. I think he's absolutely marvellous.

And it's nice to see Toronto come off looking pretty spiffy.

Next time they're in town, the Toronto Star will take them out for bacon and syrup. All they can eat.