Ken Jeong Is Still Embarrassed He Didn’t Guess This 'Masked Singer' Contestant

Ken Jeong, who is famous for his ridiculous wrong guesses on The Masked Singer, talks to Yahoo Entertainment about the one reveal that surprised him the most, in all five seasons of the show.

Video Transcript

KEN JEONG: I just heard about it. I just heard it. It's a dating show where people are wearing masks, or as I like to call it, "The Masked Swingers."

- I want to get married. I want to have babies before I'm like 26. Do you have health insurance?

KEN JEONG: I did bring up to the creator and executive producer of the Masked Singer about doing The Masked Comedian, because I think that could be a fun show. You could bring up some-- some comedians who do their act and really have-- and you know, a lot of the-- just like singing, a lot of like doing stand up comedy is visual. You're performing. You know, you're-- you're adding a facial expression or you're doing something physical. What if you don't have that?

What if you have something else and it's just based on your joke? There's a world where The Masked Comedian could exist, you know. I would love to be on it and I'm sure I would get that wrong, too and I'm sure I'd have a lot of close friends on that show. I would love to see if I would get things more correct or you know I probably would be just as bad, who knows.

First season, it was Margaret Cho as the poodle. Margaret Cho is one of my dear friends. She helped me get my start in stand up comedy. One of my very first gigs, many years ago, was being her opening act at the college that I went to, at Duke. She really has given me advice and has given me guidance throughout my career and she's such a pioneer in Asian-American comedy that I actually wrote a part for her on my show, Doctor Ken, where she played my sister.

So I know her very well and love her so much. I had no idea who she was and when she was revealed, if you watch the episode, I'm not only shocked, but embarrassed. And Margaret said, and it was very, very genuine. She said, "I'm really shocked that you did not guess it was me."

MARGARET CHO: Ken, I thought you would know.

KEN JEONG: I know she's my sister on Dr. Ken.

MARGARET CHO: I know. We're family.

KEN JEONG: I had all the clues and I knew nothing. I'm so dumb. She thought of all people, I really thought Ken would guess that it was me and to this day, I'm still mildly-- I'm still embarrassed by it. And whenever I see her, I still-- it's still fresh in my mind. Where I just can't live that down. I'm a very talkative guy and I'm still speechless by that.

I think the great thing about the Masked Singer is-- it's authentic. I'm really not that good at the game play.

- We love you for watching this evening, but this is for New York.

KEN JEONG: I think the guests that I can't live down. I guess someone was Mariah Carey, and it turned out to be Wendy Williams. But we had a feature where we had to write down just first instinct guess, and we're running out of time.

Look. I feel very embarrassed about this one. I won't lie to you.

NICK CANON: Did you call these guess based off of my familiarity and reaction with the lips?

KEN JEONG: Just cause you kissed.

NICK CANON: Because I kissed the lips.

KEN JEONG: I just-- I just kissed and I just-- I didn't know and I swear to God, I'm so sorry. And since is Nick Cannon was talking, I just was like, he was married to Mariah Carey. I don't know why. I just wrote that down in a panic. When Wendy was eliminated, they read out the first guess that comes to mind and it was Mariah Cary.

NICK CANON: Ken's first impression guess is Mariah Carey.

- Oh my gosh, Ken

- Get out. Get out.

KEN JEONG: Again, just right up there with Margaret Cho, I had a bit of an anxiety attack, was just a little bit. I was kind of panicked and wrote down Mariah Carey. And I-- and I knew it. Literally, when they cut out a lot where Nick was about to read it. He couldn't stop laughing.

And I was like, "OK. Just-- all right. Just, you know, just get to it, man. And just get to it. And they're just-- I mean, if you the uncut version, man. Everything-- you know, If you saw the uncut version. Oh my goodness. I couldn't live that down.

I think we should just maybe start over like next episode.