When dishing on how the 'humiliating' moment deeply impacted the comic and his daughters, fellow comedian Leslie Jones admits to being 'so infuriated' by Will's action.
- Sep 18, 2023
AceShowbiz - Chris Rock had to seek counseling following the "humiliating" Oscars incident. Speaking out of her longtime friend's condition after he got slapped by Will Smith at the 2022 Academy Awards, Leslie Jones has revealed that Chris had to go counseling with his daughters in the aftermath of the debacle.
"That s**t was humiliating," the former "Saturday Night Live" star told PEOPLE of how the incident "really affected" Chris. She added, "People need to understand his daughters, his parents, saw that. He had to go to counseling with his daughters."
Leslie herself admitted she was enraged by Will's action. "It made me so infuriated...," she said of her reaction when watching it unfold on TV. "You don't know that I was going to jump in my car and roll up there. I was so f**king mad on so many levels."
"For a long a** time I was just mad," the funnywoman said of the shocking slap. "Chris Rock did a f**king joke." She continued, "I know Will, too... I was like, you couldn't handle that s**t afterwards. This is the Oscars. The whole world is watching."
Leslie further slammed Will over how he handled the drama. "He could have still fixed it," she said of the "King Richard" star, who returned to the stage shortly after for his Best Actor acceptance speech. She said of what Will should have said at the time, " 'I shouldn't have did that. Bring Chris out. I can not accept the Oscar right now because that was f**king wrong.' "
The 56-year-old went on recalling her conversation with Chris after the incident. "I was like, 'Chris, when he got up why didn't you run?' " she shared. " 'I would've been running around that stage like "Will, calm down. Jada, call your man!' "
Leslie then defended Chris for addressing the drama in his Netflix special "Selective Outrage" that debuted last March. She said, "Everybody got pissed off about him doing a special. That's what comedians do. Instead of us going crazy we f**king go talk about it on the f**king stage. Thank God we've got the stage."
In his Netflix special, Chris poked fun at the Oscars slap. Pointing out his and Will's size difference, the "Grown Ups" star said that Will played Muhammad Ali while he played Pookie in "New Jack City". "Yes it hurt. It still hurts. I got 'Summertime' ringing in my ears. My f**king drums bleed," so he claimed.
He also hit back at Will by joking about Jada Pinkett Smith's entanglement with August Alsina. He joked that Will practices "selective outrage" by slapping him instead of the singer, who had an affair with his wife. "Everyone called Will a b***h, " for putting up with Jada's affair, "but I'm the one he hit," he said. "A n***a knows he can beat. That is some b***h a** s**t."
