Will Smith apologized to Chris Rock following a physical altercation caused by Rock comparing Will’s Wife, Jada Pinkett Smith to G.I Jane, which was highly inappropriate and insensitive as Jada has been very open about her hair loss journey due to alopecia.
Will Smith won the Oscar for Best Actor thanks to his amazing performance in King Richard and had the chance to address his unexpected altercation with Chris Rock during his acceptance speech.
While the entire acceptance speech didn’t focus on them physical altercation, Smith did make an indirect reference to it at the beginning, saying:
“Richard Williams was a fierce defender of his family”
“I’m being called on in my life to love people and to protect people and to be a river to my people. I know to do what we do, you gotta be able to take abuse, you gotta be able to have people talk crazy about you, you gotta be able to have people disrespecting you, and you have to smile and pretend like that’s okay.”
The 53-year-old went on to apologize:
“I want to apologize to the Academy; I want to apologize to all my fellow nominees. This is a beautiful moment and I’m not, I’m not crying for winning an award. It’s not about winning an award for me, it’s about being able to shine a light on all of the people.”
Ending the speech with:
“I hope the Academy invites me back; thank you.”
Will Smith breaks down on stage and apologises. Must see pic.twitter.com/W7Ev6l6AhG
— Manak Gupta (@manakgupta) March 28, 2022
At this point, neither Jada nor Chris have spoken out publicly about what happened.
