Oscars producer on why he prevented Will Smith’s eviction after Chris Rock slap

An Oscars insider has revealed why Will Smith wasn’t removed despite allegedly being asked to leave after slapping Chris Rock.

Oscars producer Will Packer said Friday he had not “been part of” any conversations asking Will Smith to leave the ceremony after the actor slapped Chris Rock, but prevented efforts to “physically remove” the star.

Following the incident on Monday, fellow producer Shayla Cowan approached Packer and said they were about to “physically remove Will Smith,” but because he had not been included in those discussions, he prevented it from happening.

“I immediately went to the Academy leadership that was on-site and said, ‘Chris Rock doesn’t want that,’” Packer recalled on Good Morning America.

“I said, ‘Rock has made it clear that he does not want to make a bad situation worse. That was Chris’s image,’ so I was advocating what Rock wanted in that time, which was not to physically remove Will Smith at that time because, as it has now been explained to me, that was the only option at that point.”

Will Packer says he was acting for Chris Rock in not having Will Smith booted. Picture: Getty Images.

Packer, 47, also said there was another conversation that he was “not part of” where people had asked Smith, 53, to “voluntarily leave” the show.

However, insiders have refuted the claim, with a new report in TMZ claiming that a consensus was never reached because officials were split about how to handle the situation.

Smith apologised to Packer the following morning for ruining the producer’s “gigantic moment” and expressed his “embarrassment,” which the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air alum also did in a public apology to Rock.

Claims Will Smith was ever asked to leave the ceremony after the slap have come into question over the past few days. Picture: AFP.

On Thursday, the Academy claimed in a statement after the incident that it had asked the King Richard to star to leave the ceremony, but he allegedly “refused.” Sources later told TMZ that the organisation had lied about what had unfolded, claiming some wanted Smith to leave but others did not.

A source who was behind the scenes at the Oscars doubled down to Page Six Friday morning that Rock had never been asked about removing Will Smith, adding, “Chris was asked if he wanted to press charges by the LAPD, that’s all. It was up to the Academy to tell Will to leave, that’s their job. Chris just wanted to get out of there.”

Packer, however, allegedly said Smith could stay, which echoes what he said in his GMA interview.

The executive producer also said police were “prepared” to arrest Smith if Rock, 57, decided to press charges, which he did not.

This article originally appeared in the New York Post and is reproduced here with permission