Chris Rock blames Jada Pinkett Smith for the Oscar slap

Chris Rock put Jada Pinkett Smith on blast for last year’s Oscars slap in his new Netflix special, Selective Outrage.

Chris Rock slap

As expected, Chris Rock took time in his new Netflix special to address the infamous Oscars slap, in which Will Smith rushed the stage after the comedian made a joke at Jada Pinkett Smith’s expense. 

Selective Outrage was a highly anticipated special, not only as Netflix’s first livestreamed comedy special but because it would be Rock’s widest audience yet since the Oscars incident. Not only did Chris Rock discuss the slap itself, but Will Smith and his wife, taking on the couple’s personal life–which, since they’re celebrities, has become public life–directly, even saying the special’s title comes from the pair. “Will Smith practices ‘Selective Outrage’…Everybody who really knows, knows I had nothing to do with that shit. I didn’t have any ‘entanglements’…His wife was f**king her son’s friend. I normally would not talk about this shit…I have no idea why two talented people would do something that fucking lowdown. We’ve all been cheated on, everybody in here been cheated on. None of us has ever been interviewed by the person that cheated on us, on television… She hurt him way more than he hurt me.”

Adding on to this, Chris Rock suggested there was even more that led up to the Oscars slap, that something was brewing between him and the Smith family for some time. “She f**king said [I] should quit because Will didn’t get nominated for Concussion. What the f*ck? So then I do some jokes about it, who gives a f*ck? That’s how it is. She started it, I finished it. Nobody’s picking on this bitch. She started this shit. Nobody was picking on her.”

Chris Rock also recycled some of the slap jokes he had honed throughout his Ego Death World Tour, such as calling Will Smith “Suge Smith”, saying that the Oscar winner is significantly larger–even in animated movies–and that he only watch Emancipation to see Smith get beat.

This year’s Oscars, which Chris Rock reportedly turned down hosting, take place on March 12th. Will Smith will not be on hand to present the Best Actress statue (as is tradition), since he has been banned from attending for a decade.

Did you watch Chris Rock’s Selective Outrage? How do you think he handled the topic of the Oscars slap? Let us know in the comments section below.

Source: Variety

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Mathew is an East Coast-based writer and film aficionado who has been working with JoBlo.com periodically since 2006. When he’s not writing, you can find him on Letterboxd or at a local brewery. If he had the time, he would host the most exhaustive The Wonder Years rewatch podcast in the universe.