‘I lost my mind, you know?’: Will Smith reflects on Oscar slap

At the 2022 Oscars in March, The Method Williams actor took the stage and slapped comedian Chris Rock, who had given his wife Jada Pinkett Smith — who suffers from alopecia — GI John. After avoiding the spotlight for a while, Will Smith appeared on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah on Monday (28Nov22) to promote his new historical drama Redemption.

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However, it was a famous slap that was discussed in the interview.

“It was a terrible night, as you can imagine. It has many nuances and complexities. But at the end of the day, I – lost my mind, you know? I was going through something that night. That doesn’t justify my behavior at all… a lot of things. The little boy who saw his father beat his mother, you know? At that point everything was cooked. It didn’t want to be like that,” said Will Smith.

He shared a story about how the eruption affected his family. “I’m gone. It’s been bottled up anger for a long time,” the comedian continued. “My nephew is nine. He’s a good little boy. We went back home. He stayed up late to see his uncle’s will and we sat in my kitchen, he was on my lap, he was holding an Oscar. And he said, ‘Why did you hit that man, Uncle Will?

Will Smith apologized to Academy members and colleagues during his Best Actor acceptance speech at the film event and issued a lengthy apology on Instagram. He resigned from the Academy and was subsequently banned from attending the Oscars for 10 years.

Elsewhere in the interview, the actor discussed emancipation and how he decided to play Peter, a slave who escapes from a Louisiana plantation after nearly being whipped.

“American slavery was one of the most brutal aspects of human history… The scale of human cruelty is hard to fathom. My daughter (Willow Smith) asked me, “Dad, do we really need another slavery movie?” I said, ‘Baby, I promise I won’t make a movie about slavery. It is a film about freedom,” he added.