See Will Smith Slap Chris Rock After A Joke Gone Bad In The Uncensored Video
Check out the uncensored video of Will Smith striking Chris Rock after the latter made a joke about Smith's wife at the Academy Awards.
This article is more than 2 years old
Hollywood got real, real weird on Sunday night during the 94th Academy Awards. What has long been a night to celebrate the best performances and movies of the past year on the big screen was overshadowed by an altercation between Will Smith and Chris Rock. During the ceremony, Will Smith approached the stage and slapped Rock after the latter had made a “joke” about Jada Pinkett Smith. The incident overshadowed really anything else that happened that evening, including Will Smith actually winning the Oscar for Best Actor. It’s a crazy situation, one that will surely be talked about for some time.
During the show, Chris Rock was presenting the award for Best Documentary and during it, he made a joke about/ to Jada Pinkett Smith referencing her possibly starring in a GI Jane sequel. This was apparently alluding to Pinkett Smith’s shorter hairstyle. A few seconds later, Will Smith approached the stage and slapped Chris Rock clearly across the face, leaving the latter stunned before Will Smith slowly turned and returned to his seat. You can see the uncensored video below. The feed cut out momentarily during the United States version of the show, but here you can hear both the slap and what Will Smith yells afterward. Check it out:
Oof. After Will Smith returns to his seat you can see him yelling to Chris Rock “Leave my wife’s name out your f@#$ing mouth.” The crowd’s reaction, in the moment, is a mixed bag with a number of people obviously thinking this was a staged event, meant as a little “fun” during the proceedings. It quickly became apparent that it wasn’t. Chris Rock attempts to move on, making a half-hearted joke about it being the “greatest night in the history of television,” and it was on with the awards. When dissecting why Will Smith would have reacted this way, the prevailing idea has been that it was in response to Pinkett Smith having been diagnosed with alopecia, a condition that causes baldness.
And of course, because this is Hollywood, only a short time later Will Smith received the Best Actor award for his starring role in King Richard. He took to the stage to accept the award, breaking down in tears for part of his speech. Smith mentions at the beginning of his speech that Richard Williams, who he portrayed in the movie, was a “fierce defender of his family,” and goes into the idea of protection as a theme. He went on to apologize to the Academy, though not Chris Rock. And he eventually said, “…love will make you do crazy things.” Check out Will Smith’s speech below:
In the end, Chris Rock declined to press charges (just to reaffirm that this was, in fact, real) and Will Smith winning his first Oscar had been overshadowed by what was clearly an ugly event. This was Will Smith’s third time being nominated for the award after previously getting nods for Ali and The Pursuit of Happyness. It will be interesting to see if this incident with Rock goes on to become the lasting moment from this show. I suspect, when it’s all said and done, this is what people remember and it will have been quite the shame this is how it all played out.
