Will Smith’s Oscars incident highlights Hollywood’s ugly history
If Will Smith keeps his trophy, it will be in large part because of the academy’s egregious past failures to rescind the Oscars won by far more serious offenders.
The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences says it is “upset and outraged” by the incident, and has “initiated disciplinary proceedings” against the A-lister for violating its code of conduct, “including inappropriate physical contact, abusive or threatening behaviour, and compromising the integrity of the academy”.
Should Smith be forced to hand back the best actor award he won this week for his compelling portrayal of Serena and Venus Williams’s father in the film King Richard? If Hollywood were truly aligned with community standards, the answer would be yes: in any other walk of life, smacking a colleague across the face and yelling at him, twice, at a public event to “keep my wife’s name out of your f..king mouth” would be grounds for instant dismissal, removal or even arrest. (So far Rock has declined to press charges.)
Moreover, Smith is no Hollywood hopeful, unsure of how to behave in the unforgiving glare of the spotlight: the rapper and Men in Black star is a power player whose films collectively have grossed more than $US9bn and he is executive producer on many of his projects, meaning he has the power to hire and fire. Neither is he a stranger to awards ceremonies: he is a three-time Academy Award nominee and his crowning with a best actor Oscar was widely expected, given he has had a dream run through this year’s awards season, picking up BAFTA, Critics Choice, Golden Globe and Screen Actors Guild accolades for playing the man who is arguably the world’s most successful tennis dad.
Unnamed film industry insiders have told the New York Post Smith may lose his trophy because his violent behaviour breached the academy’s code of conduct that was introduced after #MeToo scandals forced reform. Still, it is widely predicted that this will not happen.
Why? Because of the awards’ dodgy history. If Smith keeps his trophy, it will be in large part because of the academy’s egregious past failures to rescind the Oscars won by far more serious offenders such as producer Harvey Weinstein and director Roman Polanski.
Weinstein and Polanski were expelled from the academy in 2017 and 2018 for alleged misconduct, in the wake of #MeToo allegations that struck Hollywood like a tsunami. Weinstein is now serving a 23-year jail sentence for rape and sexual assault, but his 1999 Oscar for Shakespeare in Love was not revoked.
Polanski’s Oscar for The Pianist was awarded in 2003 – 26 years after he pleaded guilty to unlawful sex with a minor. In 1977, Polanski, then 43, pleaded guilty to charges of sodomy and rape by use of drugs with a 13-year-old girl. He fled the US to avoid prison. Incredibly, he was later rewarded, in absentia, with a directing Oscar and standing ovation.
Ever since Hollywood’s #OscarsSoWhite and #MeToo scandals, the academy has been desperate to clean up its act – championing diversity and zero tolerance for sexual harassers. The Weinstein scandal had revealed how the disgraced producer got away with harassing and sexually assaulting women over decades because of an unstated belief that the usual standards of workplace behaviour did not apply to the film colony.
If Smith keeps his Oscar, that culture will be invoked once more: that there is one standard for ordinary punters who behave violently and another for Hollywood insiders. However, allowing white sex offenders to retain their statuettes while cancelling a black actor’s Oscar over a slap would invite valid claims of racial discrimination.
Whoopi Goldberg, a member of the academy’s board of governors, said: “We’re not going to take that Oscar from him (Smith). There will be consequences I’m sure, but I don’t think that’s what they’ll do.”
Echoing this, Vanity Fair’s Hollywood correspondent David Canfield wrote: “While calls have been made on social media and elsewhere for his Oscar to be revoked, what’s more likely is a suspension or expulsion of the actor’s academy membership.”
Of course, if academy standards did reflect community expectations, Weinstein would have lost his award, Polanski’s gong would not have been given in the first place and Smith would have been ejected from the awards ceremony.
Instead, at Los Angeles’s Dolby Theatre on Monday, Smith was given a standing ovation – complete with cheering and whooping – about 30 minutes after he slapped Rock, as he defended his actions and cried. As high-profile US journalist Maria Shriver tweeted: “We should never get to a place where we sit and watch a movie star hit someone on global television then, moments later, get a standing ovation while talking about love.”
After partying on, Smith apologised to Rock the following day, stating that “my behaviour at last night’s Academy Awards was unacceptable and inexcusable. Jokes at my expense are a part of the job, but a joke about Jada’s medical condition was too much for me to bear and I reacted emotionally.”
A source has told online newspaper TMZ that Rock, a former Saturday Night Live star, was unaware of Pinkett Smith’s hair loss condition. Rock should still apologise for his gag, as he mocked Pinkett Smith over what turned out to be a distressing health condition. Still, that doesn’t excuse Smith’s violence.
Apparently oblivious to the gravity of Smith’s assault on Rock, Oscars producer Will Packer initially joked on Twitter: “Welp … I said it wouldn’t be boring.” This week, the academy’s position hardened into outright condemnation as public backlash grew over the incident. In a letter sent to their members, academy president David Rubin and chief executive Dawn Hudson said the organisation’s leaders were “upset and outraged” that this year’s ceremony was “overshadowed by the unacceptable and harmful behaviour on stage by a nominee”.
Even so, the academy’s awarding of the best actor gong to Smith minutes after he hit Rock has come under intense scrutiny – including from a co-host of the sensationally up-ended ceremony. Speaking on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Wanda Sykes – who hosted Hollywood’s biggest night of the year alongside Amy Schumer and Regina Hall – said she “physically felt ill” while watching Smith strike Rock onstage, and is “still a little traumatised by it”. She added: “For them to let (Smith) stay in that room and enjoy the rest of the show and accept his award, I was like, ‘How gross is this? This sends the wrong message’.”
Under the hashtag #UgliestOscarMomentEver, former Star Wars actor Mark Hamill tweeted: “Stand-up comics are very adept at handling hecklers. Violent physical assault … not so much.” Canadian-American comic and actor Jim Carrey, similarly, did not mince words. “I was sickened by the standing ovation, I felt Hollywood is just spineless, en masse,” he told CBS. (Footage soon began to circulate online of Carrey’s own misdeed at an awards night – a clip from the 1997 MTV Movie Awards showed the star, then 35, appearing to forcibly plant a kiss on 19-year-old Alicia Silverstone as he accepted a gong.)
The academy’s board of governors released a statement on Thursday morning (AEDT), revealing it had “initiated disciplinary proceedings” against Smith for breaching its code of conduct. The outcome could potentially be announced on April 18, when the next board meeting is due.
“Mr Smith’s actions at the 94th Oscars were a deeply shocking, traumatic event to witness in-person and on television,” said the statement, which included an apology from the academy to Rock. The academy also revealed that “Mr Smith was asked to leave the ceremony and refused”.
Nevertheless, Smith still has prominent supporters. Actor Tiffany Haddish, who starred in the 2017 film, Girls Trip, with Pinkett Smith, said: “I think Chris was messy.” She said he hurt Pinkett Smith and that Will Smith “protected his wife. And that’s what a man is supposed to do.”
British controversialist Piers Morgan called the slap “without a doubt the ugliest ever seen at the Academy Awards in its 94-year history” but went on to defend Smith. Writing in The Sun newspaper, Morgan argued that if Rock knew Pinkett Smith suffered from alopecia and told his joke – likening her to a GI Jane character with a buzz cut – “then it was a nasty, cruel quip that warranted a husband’s wrath … Will Smith didn’t punch him. It was just a slap, that Rock shrugged off.”
Morgan accused those calling for Smith’s Oscar to be rescinded of hysteria: “As the cancel culture mob race to destroy him, hysterically demanding he be stripped of his best actor award and charged with assault, I find myself moved to defend him … In previous eras, he’d have been saluted for defending his girl, not savaged by an overly sensitive snowflake society.” (It’s true that it’s a worn-out cliche within Hollywood films that any red-blooded leading man must deck anyone who insults his wife or girlfriend, or raise his fists while his co-stars struggle to hold him back.)
Why did Smith explode on what should have been the biggest night of his acting career? His meltdown has highlighted his open marriage – and the ribbing he and Pinkett Smith have endured for talking about it. In 2020 the couple spoke about Pinkett Smith’s relationship with singer August Alsina while Pinkett Smith and Smith were separated. In September last year, Smith told GQ magazine their relationship had moved beyond monogamy because marriage “can’t be a prison”. The actor, who recently said he fantasised about dating a “harem of girlfriends” including Halle Berry, added: “Jada never believed in conventional marriage.”
Last month, when Smith won a BAFTA for his King Richard performance, host Rebel Wilson joked: “I thought his best performance over the past year was being OK with all his wife’s boyfriends.” Smith wasn’t there but shot back later: “There’s never been infidelity in our marriage. Jada and I talk about everything.”
If a winner emerges from slap-gate, it will be Rock – he kept his cool even though he was shaken by the onstage attack, and quipped sarcastically: “That was the greatest night in the history of television.”
Demand for the comedian’s live shows soared in the two days following the incident.
On Thursday Australian time, Rock performed a sold-out stand-up show in Boston and told the audience “I’m still processing what happened (at the Oscars)”, before moving on to his comedy routine.
The Madagascar and Grown Ups star received two standing ovations and had tears in his eyes over this show of support, according to a CNN journalist who attended the show.
More Coverage
The Iran regime is fighting for its life. If the US attacks, its goose may well be cooked
We stand on the cusp of new transformations in the Middle East, and the potential defeat and eclipse of the main engine of political Islam.
Government’s inexorable growth is killing incentive
One of things we teach our children is that there is difference between wants and needs. Too many politicians have forgotten this lesson and are happy to spend other people’s money.
The Will Smith slap witnessed by millions of viewers has been described as the ugliest moment in the Academy Awards’ 94-year history. Smith’s physical attack on comedian Chris Rock for mocking wife Jada Pinkett Smith’s shaved head – she suffers from alopecia, or hair loss – has split the entertainment industry, with Smith’s supporters insisting he was defending his partner against a cruel joke and detractors accusing him of an outrageous display of toxic masculinity.