Oscars on Will Smith’s Attack: ‘The Academy Does Not Condone Violence of Any Form’

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, which awards the Oscars, responded Sunday evening to Best Actor winner Will Smith slapping comedian and co-host Chris Rock onstage, rejecting violence without withdrawing Smith’s award.

“The Academy does not condone violence of any form,” it tweeted. “Tonight we are delighted to celebrate our 94th Academy Awards winners, who deserve this moment of recognition from their peers and movie lovers around the world.”

Smith assaulted Rock on live television because of a joke Rock told about Smith’s wife, as Breitbart News reported:

Smith initially appeared to laugh after Rock made fun of his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, for her alopecia, a condition that causes hair loss. Rock suggested that she star in G.I. Jane 2, referring to Demi Moore, who shaved her head in the original.

Then, Smith climbed onstage, walked up to Rock, and struck him in the face before returning to his seat. Rock, stunned, exclaimed: “Wow! Will Smith just smacked the shit out of me!”

Smith, from the audience, yelled: “Keep my wife’s name out your f*ckin’ mouth!”

Rock responded: “Wow, dude! It was a G.I. Jane joke.”

Smith repeated: “Keep my wife’s name out your f*ckin’ mouth!”

“I’m going to, OK? Wow. OK. That was a … greatest night the history of television,” Rock continued.

After the incident, security did not remove Smith, nor was he arrested. He went on to deliver an acceptance speech after winning Best Actor for portraying Richard Williams, father to tennis stars Venus and Serna Williams, in King Richard.

The audience applauded his speech.

Reactions to the assault were mixed, with director Judd Apatow calling Smith’s attack “pure narcissism,” while actor and singer Leslie Odom Jr. called it a “beautiful” expression of authentic and “vulnerable” feeling among two artists.

Joel B. Pollak is Senior Editor-at-Large at Breitbart News and the host of Breitbart News Sunday on Sirius XM Patriot on Sunday evenings from 7 p.m. to 10 p.m. ET (4 p.m. to 7 p.m. PT). He is the author of the recent e-book, Neither Free nor Fair: The 2020 U.S. Presidential Election. His recent book, RED NOVEMBER, tells the story of the 2020 Democratic presidential primary from a conservative perspective. He is a winner of the 2018 Robert Novak Journalism Alumni Fellowship. Follow him on Twitter at @joelpollak.