And in March 2022, Smith went on stage at the Oscars and slapped Rock after the comedian made a joke about the appearance of Jada Pinkett Smith, Will Smith’s wife. Smith, the “King Richard” star, then returned to his seat in the audience and later won the Best Actor award.
Since then, Rock has kept silent about the incident.
But the 58-year-old actor finally decided to talk about Smith, as he said in a special comedy episode shown live on the “Netflix” platform, that he enjoyed seeing Smith take the hits in his latest movie.
He added, “Everyone knows, yes it happened. I was slapped a year ago – I was slapped before this (..)”, highlighting: “People ask: Did it hurt? Yes, the slapping still hurts. I heard the ringing in my ear.”
He continued, “I am still processing what happened. So at some point I will talk about this. It will be serious and funny.”
Rock indicated that Smith’s wife sowed the seeds of tension between them, in part because of her call to boycott the Oscars in 2016 when Rock was the host. Pinkett Smith said at the time that she was protesting that her husband and other black actors were not nominated for the awards.
And he added, “I loved Will Smith, I loved him all my life, and he played some great roles.”
Regarding the reason why he did not respond to Will Smith’s slapping in the same way, Rock said sarcastically: “I have two parents, and do you know what my parents taught me? .. Do not fight in front of white people.”
Will Smith issued a statement apologizing to Rock and the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which awards the Oscars, the day after the ceremony. The Academy banned Smith from attending the Academy Awards for 10 years.
The Rock comedy special is Netflix’s first live event, as the platform is testing the technology and considering expanding to live broadcasts for other programmes.
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