Kevin Hart Makes First Television Appearance Since Car Accident on ‘The Ellen DeGeneres Show’

Kevin Hart appeared on The Ellen DeGeneres Show on Wednesday in his first television appearance since his September car accident, stopping by to promote his new movie Jumanji: The Next Level. Hart also discussed his recovery from the accident, after which he reportedly required him to undergo surgery to fuse two fractures in his spine. The actor and comedian was hospitalized for 10 days before being released to undergo physical therapy, and told DeGeneres that at one point, “I couldn’t even wipe my a—.”

“You don’t realize that your back is connected to everything, so coming out of back surgery everything changed because you’re kinda helpless,” he explained. “That’s when you see what really matters, who really matters. Life kind of hits you in a completely different way.

Hart shared that while he was in the hospital, he was surrounded by his family members including his wife, his kids, his mom and his brother.

“You go, ‘Wow! This is love,’” he said. “‘This is what real love and life is.’ And the things that you think matter, you realize don’t. It’s not about your level of success, it’s not about how much money you have, it’s about that. It’s about those individuals and who you really mean the most to and who mean the most to you. I’ve got a completely different look on life now, a much better one.”

“I think there’s something special about any journey,” he continued. “It doesn’t matter what the journey is, I think there’s an amazing thing about knowing there’s a road that you gotta get down and along that road are a lot of peaks, hills, valleys, and at the end of it, all of those peaks, hills and valleys make so much sense because of the punctuation at the end. I like saying, ‘Ok, it’s time to rebuild,’ but we’re not rebuilding to get back to the old you, we’re rebuilding to be better and become a new you.”

The actor shared that he’s “about 65 to 75 percent” back to his “physical self” and that his initial recovery saw him focus on being able to care for himself again.

“My biggest triumph was when I put my socks on, when I put my socks on it was the biggest thing in the world,” he said.

Hart reflected that he thinks the accident was life’s way of telling him to slow down.

“I will be honest, it made me so happy,” he said. “Being home for that amount of time made me happy. I was sat down. I feel like God sat me down.”

Photo Credit: The Ellen DeGeneres Show