James Corden is giving Joe Jonas the lowdown on the reason why he wasn’t driving during Justin Bieber’s “Carpool Karaoke” episode.
As a refresher, earlier this year, a video of James and Justin shooting their “Carpool Karaoke” segment went viral. The clip appears to show James sitting in the the driver’s seat and Justin riding shotgun. The thing is, it looked like James wasn’t even driving the car – their car was actually mounted on some small wheels and was being pulled by a truck.
The video sparked a lot of speculations on whether the host does indeed drive during the popular segment. Following the outcry from fans on social media, The Late Late Show issued a statement that James DOES drive on “Carpool Karaoke” – except when there are special circumstances involved.
On Monday (April 27), James had Joe on The Late Late Show as his guest, and their conversation came around to James’ driving during his “Carpool Karaoke” segment.
“I saw the rumor a while back that you didn’t drive your own car. You drove your car that day,” Joe said, referring to the time he and his brothers, Nick and Kevin, joined him for the segment. “I will back you up. I don’t know about the other days, but that day [you did].”
“Thank you, Joe. Thank you. I appreciate you saying that. That means a great deal,” James replied. “… I have driven it for 47 of the 52, yes.”
Joe joked that there were “probably 3,000 girls following you and you want to make sure you have somebody safely driving the way.”
But James said, “That wasn’t the reason.”
“Should I tell you the actual reason, the genuine reason why I didn’t drive with Justin Bieber?” he asked. “I had a problem with my eye and we were worried that it wasn’t safe.”
“I believe you, because we were on your show a few months later. I remember you telling me that, so I can back you up again,” Joe said. “Even though that sounds like a big lie, it’s true.”
James has previously addressed the “very very serious allegations” against him – and did it with a light-hearted approach.
He called the accusations that he doesn’t drive at all during the segment “fake news.”
“I know this looks bad. But I just want to say right now that I always drive the car unless we’re doing something where we think it might not be safe, like a dance routine or a costume change or if I’m drunk,” he said.
Explaining that using the rig for his upcoming sketch with Justin was a “safety issue,” he quipped, “Frankly, I just kept getting lost in his eyes.”
He then went on to point out that the video has gotten over 13 million views – more than some of the “Carpool Karaoke” videos, adding, “I’m just shocked. I’ve done something that upset people more than Cats.”
He says that he drives 95% of the time in “Carpool Karaoke,” and raised the point, “I want credit for it because I was raised driving on the completely different side of the road!”
He also gave the hilarious lowdown on what’s what when they film.
“I hate to be the bearer of even more bad news, but while we’re getting things out in the open, I don’t actually need them to help me get to work,” he joked, referring to the musicians who join him in the cars. “Often, I’m at work already. We’ve also never once, in the history of doing that bit, ever used the carpool lane. There’s not even a carpool lane on my way to work and I just thought that we all knew this. And I’m sorry that you were so deep into the reality of ‘Carpool Karaoke,’ but it’s TV and sometimes we do stuff just for the sake of entertainment.”
Out of all the “Carpool Karaoke” segments that they’ve done over the years, James says he’s only used the rig a total of five times.
