Have Chris Rock and Will Smith made amends?
Or is their feud only just beginning?
Rock's words post-slap might give us some indication.
The bizarre 94th Academy Awards ceremony remains in the news almost solely because of the strange
altercation between Will Smith and Chris Rock.
It's hard to imagine that anyone on the internet has not seen the footage of Smith striding
on stage to slap Rock in response to the comedian's "G.I.
Jane" joke about Jada Pinkett Smith's alopecia.
What started as a shocking moment in live television broadcast history has turned into
a fairly serious moment for the Academy at large.
Now, the organization is conducting a formal review of the incident.
People magazine reported that ABC and Academy producers discussed removing Smith from the
Dolby Theatre in Los Angeles after the incident.
However, Smith was allowed to return to his seat.
Both he and Jada appeared to be in good spirits when the show's broadcast resumed.
In fact, footage even showed Smith speaking with Denzel Washington, Tyler Perry, and his
publicist during the commercial break.
After that, Smith stayed in his seat until he was announced as the winner of the Best
Actor award for his performance in "King Richard."
"It's a lot of emotion and it's probably all welling up in him right now."
Rock, for his part, has not spoken publicly since he left the stage on Sunday night.
But based on what he reportedly said to Oscars crew members and other presenters during his
exit, it sounds like he tried to maintain a sense of humor about the situation.
According to Vanity Fair's live reporting from the Oscars, Rock continued to play off
the altercation by cracking a joke about Will Smith's role as Muhammad Ali in the 2001 biopic.
"Ali" is particularly notable in Smith's career as it was the first role for which he received
a nomination for an Academy Award.
Rock reportedly told crew and other Oscars presenters after he exited the stage,
"That's the only time you get hit [by] Muhammad Ali and it doesn't leave a scratch."
During Sunday night's telecast, Smith offered an apology to the Academy and to the show's
audience when he accepted his Oscar for Best Actor.
However, he did not offer a public apology to Rock for the incident until Monday.
On his Instagram account, Smith acknowledged that he was embarrassed by his actions, and
sorry for resorting to violence.
Smith wrote,
"I would like to publicly apologize to you, Chris.
I was out of line and I was wrong."
While Rock reportedly declined to press charges against Smith, the comedian has not offered
any public comments since he left the stage during the show.
Meanwhile, Sean "Diddy" Combs told Page Six at the Vanity Fair afterparty that Smith and
Rock had made amends.
However, the same outlet clarified that Combs spoke individually with Smith and Rock, and
that the two had not actually spoken one-on-one since the altercation.
Chris Rock's remark after getting slapped seems to indicate he's taking the incident
in his stride.
While plenty of people online condemned Will Smith's actions, others weren't so quick to
take a side.
Comedian Patton Oswalt posted several choice tweets about the slap.
Comedic actor Diedrich Bader also got in on the fun, taking to Twitter to write,
"As a minor celebrity i feel like i have 27-30 hours to do anything i want and no one will
notice."
But it wasn't just comedians who saw the lighter side of the situation.
Pennsylvania representative Malcolm Kenyatta showed no one knows his state better than
him when he wrote,
"Will Smith smacking Chris Rock and QuestLove winning an Oscar are the two most back to
back Philly things to ever happen at the Oscars."
"First of all, I've seen a man stand up for his wife."
And those are just a few of the reactions from public figures.
The rest of the general public has done what they do best in these scenarios, and that's
turn the event into a meme.
In the aftermath of the slap, numerous people have made some variation of the joke, "Paper
beats rock," in reference to Smith using an open hand to hit Rock.
It's only natural for some people to use humor to defuse a tense situation, as Chris Rock
probably knows all too well.
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