It took almost a year, but Chris Bato finally answered slapped by Will Smith at the 2022 Academy Awards in his new Netflix standup special, Chosen Anger.
What Chris Rock Said About Will Smith in Selective Outrage?
Almost a year after the 2022 Oscars, Rock is finally giving his side of the season story Chosen Angera live special airing on Netflix.
“You know what happened to me, Suge Smith punched me… I got slapped at the f*cking Oscars by this motherf*cker. People are like, ‘Does it hurt?’ It still hurts! I have ‘Summertime’ still ringing in my ears.
“I know you can’t say on camera: Will Smith is bigger than me. We’re not the same guy, OK? We’re not. Will Smith does movies shirtless. You’ve never seen me who goes to the movies with my shirt off. When I’m in a movie with heart surgery, I wear a sweater. Will Smith plays Muhammad Ali in a movie! You think I auditioned for that part? He played Muhammad Ali, I played Pookie New Jack City! I play corn Pootie Tang!”
“But I’m not a victim,” Rock added, saying he wouldn’t “cry” at Oprah Winfrey. “I took that hit like Pacquiao, motherf*cker.”
Rock blamed Smith’s outburst on extracurricular factors — specifically, Jada Pinkett-Smith’s relationship with August Alsina.
“All that is known indeed know I don’t care about that shit. I don’t have any ‘entanglements.’ i don’t have I don’t have any ‘troubles.’ And for people who don’t know… Will Smith’s wife is dating his son’s friend. Now, I normally don’t talk about this shit, but for some reason these ni**** put that shit on the internet.
“He hurt her more than he hurt me, OK? And so, she did that and everyone in the world called her a bitch. I tried to call the motherf*cker and give him my condolences but he didn’t pick me up. Everyone called her a bitch. Everything. And who did he hit? I… That’s bitch-ass sh*t. That’s what happened in the f*ck, OK? Get the f*ck out of here, man! I didn’t do anything on this day.”
“All my life I have rooted for this motherf*cker. And now, I’m watching FREEDOM just to see him hurt. I’m rooted in Massa, OK? Hit him again, Massa! Hit him again! You’ve lost your place! A lot of people say, ‘Chris, why haven’t you done anything? Why didn’t you do anything that night?’ Because I have parents. And you know what my parents taught me? Don’t fight in front of white people!
Chris Rock Also Has Some Words for Jada Pinkett-Smith
During the Oscars, Rock joked that Pinkett-Smith looked like “GI Jane 2,” an apparent reference to her shaved head. Afterwards, Smith came on stage and punched Rock in the face. “Keep my wife’s name out of your mouth!” he shouted.
As Rock explained, by the end of the night Smiths was already worried about a joke he made about Pinkett-Smith years ago, when he hosted the 2016 Oscars. The Smiths that year boycotted Will from being nominated concussionand apparently they encouraged Rock to do the same.
“Jada said she wasn’t coming [out of] protest. I said, ‘Isn’t he in a TV show?’ Is Jada boycotting the Oscars? Jada boycotting the Oscars is like me boycotting Rihanna’s panties. I wasn’t invited!” Rock remembers saying.
“He said, ‘He has to stop because Will didn’t get nominated concussion.’ What the f*ck? So, I joked about it. Who gives an af*ck? Like that. He started it, I finished it, OK? That’s what the f*ck happened. Nobody picked on this ass. He started this shit. No one chose him. No one chose him. She said that I, a grown ass, had to quit her job because her husband was not nominated for the concussion, and then this n***a gave me a scary shiver, OK? What the hell, man!”
What Did Smith Say About the Plague?
“It was a terrible night, as you can imagine,” Smith said in an appearance on The Daily Show in November 2022. “There’s a lot of nuances and complexities to it, you know. But at the end of the day, I just – I’m missing it, you know. And I guess what I’m going to say, you never know -an what a man goes through. I went through something that night, you know? Not that that justifies my behavior.”
Smith also said that his upbringing probably influenced his actions. “A lot of things, the little boy watching his father beat his mother. That all just erupted in that moment. That’s not what I wanted. I understand how it shocks people, man. I don’t have anymore . It was an anger that had been bottled up for a long time.”
As a result of Smith’s actions, the Academy Board of Governors BANNED from attending the Oscars for 10 years.
Where Can I Find Selective Outrage?
Chosen Anger aired live on Netflix on Saturday, March 4 – marking Netflix’s first-ever global livestreaming event. It is available to replay on demand via Netflix.