‘Mouths to feed’: How lockdown inspired Jimmy Rees

From children’s entertainer to “overnight viral sensation”, Jimmy Rees reveals having five mouths to feed forced his Covid reinvention.

Melburnians like nothing more than letting rip on those born with a silver spoon in their mouth, no matter how tarnished.

The uppercrusters, the plums-in-mouth, the coiffured, self-entitled.

The Toorak toffs, the Brightonites, even those from the leafy ‘burbs with their SUVs get a bad press.

This column has made a living off it and so too does comedian Jimmy Rees.

Brightonites and your “wanker coffees” be warned.

Lockdown has unearthed plenty of Karens, kooks and killjoys and now “overnight viral sensation” Jimmy Rees, nee Jimmy Giggle.

Jimmy Giggle was the ever-smiling face on ABC Kids with his owl sidekick Hoot.

The bubbly Jimmy Giggle played virtual babysitter for sleep-deprived parents.

Giggle and Hoot presented children’s shows from Lola and Charlie to Bluey on ABC Kids until he joyously bobbed up in his yellow pyjamas to mark bedtime with his Goodnight Song.

Now Giggle has turned into a hoot.

Calling time on the ABC Kids show two years go, Rees and his young family, wife Tori, 5-year-old son Lenny and twin toddler boys Mack and Vinny, moved from Sydney to his Mornington hometown.

Then came the global pandemic.

Comedian Jimmy Rees. Picture: YouTube

Rees says all his gigs dried up in 2020. Picture: YouTube

“At the start of 2020 when everything got cancelled all my gigs dried up. I am the breadwinner, my wife is a teacher and she had a few days here or there. But I had five mouths to feed,” Rees told Page 13.

“I’d always wanted to do my own content online but was always a little bit cautious with the job that I had as a kids entertainer.

“So I sort of just parked it a bit but then with COVID and having to reinvent myself I guess it just gave me a kick up the bum – just do it you idiot.”

Cooped up in lockdown he released a “silly” one minute video titled, “Things My Five-Year-Old Does.”

Overnight, it clocked up over two million hits.

“It can be a bit nerve racking to put yourself out there instead of a character. Then it just grew,” Rees said.

“I literally just thought I’m going to do something silly and thought about this stuff my five-year-old son does.

“He licks the salt shaker, he will drag his fingers along the window, all that sort of silly stuff.

“I put it down to the timing. A lot of people were online and they needed something as well. It was just an aligning.”

Rees admits he’s a long way from Jimmy Giggle. Picture: Red Management

A video on “The Guy Who Decides Packaging” has had global reach.

“Something just resonated. It was an observation no one had really observed before and was staring us in the face. Sometimes they are the ones that resonate the most or go viral.

“I don’t know how I come up with the stuff. I always test them on my wife. Like what do you think about this, have you had to cut your scissors out of the scissors packet type thing.

“She will say that’s stupid, or if I get more than one eye-roll I know it’s probably silly enough to do.”

Rees has now amassed more than eight million likes on TikTok and counting. A bona fide social media sensation he now makes coin via You Tube and Facebook.

“One of the questions I now get asked a lot is – so what else are you doing? How are you making money?

“But you can make a decent living off it if you have got enough people following you and enough people watching.

“I could see the potential in it really fast. TikTok you can’t really monetise that but Facebook you can. When you click a YouTube video there is an ad and they pay you a revenue for that.”

Rees says you can make a decent living if you have enough online followers. Picture: Red Management

James Rees as Jimmy Giggle with Hoot the owl on ABC.

Then came Briiiiiiiiiiighton and getting a Phiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiizer jab.

“I often ask my audience for ideas that are a bit left of centre and these two ladies said what about the whole age thing with the jab, maybe it’s causing a stir in Brighton?

I thought, yes, I’m running with that.”

Think Kath and Kim’s Pru and Trude on steroids.

Rees released, Meanwhile in Brighton Part Four, this week and with pharmaceutical company Pfizer also owning Viagra, the content just keeps pumping up.

A children’s book, Bedtime Sorted, will be released next month.

But Rees admits he is a long way from Jimmy Giggle.

His millions of global fans can’t believe he was a kids entertainer.

“A lot of parents follow me because they know me from Jimmy Giggle days and the kids have grown up.

“Then there are people who don’t even know what Giggle and Hoot was and they are like ‘What the …. this guy was a children’s entertainer are you kidding me.”

What a hoot!

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