No, Russian President Vladimir Putin didn’t let his wolf out of its cage to roam the halls of Olympic athletes’ dorms. But late-night funnyman Jimmy Kimmel sure did … well, sort of.
Earlier this week, Team USA luger Kate Hansen experienced her own#SochiFail, posting a video on her Twitter and YouTube page of a wolf roaming the halls of the athlete dorms in Sochi, Russia. It’s well known that stray dogs wander around the host city of the 2014 Winter Olympics, so the idea of a wolf making its way into the building isn’t too far fetched.
The video quickly spread like wildfire across local and national news networks. But late-night television host Jimmy Kimmel revealed the wolf wasn’t actually in Sochi — and definitely wasn’t in Hansen’s dormitory.
Instead, the video was shot and filmed at his studio in Los Angeles. With the help of Hansen, Kimmel and the Olympic athlete managed to prank America.
While Hansen let on that she received a little bit of backlash from the hilarious prank, Kimmel reminded her of this little thing called the freedom of expression in the good ole U.S. of A.
“You know what, though, I will say this. The U.S. Olympic Committee or whoever should remember one important thing,” Kimmel said. “U.S. stands for United States and we have a little something called freedom of expression here, so if they give you any trouble, just point them to the Constitution.”
Hansen, who decided to lay low after the video was posted, said her teammates were all abuzz as news of the clip spread. Security in the building also was alerted, as there was a “breach within, ” she said.
“It kind of went a little crazy over here,” Hansen said.
Kimmel’s team worked for roughly 15 hours to construct a replica of the hallway outside of Hansen’s room. And they used a real wolf, named Rugby, in the video, not a Husky or dog.
Though Hansen didn’t medal at the Olympics, placing 10th overall, Kimmel did present her with a gold medal in pranking.
Watch how the duo pulled off the hilarious prank below.
