New details about the strange relationship of America’s most dysfunctional celebrity couple have emerged with Jada Pinkett Smith dishing on the context of the infamous “slap heard around the world” at the 94th annual Academy Awards ceremony.
The 52-year-old actress sat down for an interview with People magazine and dished on the divorce rumors between herself and actor husband Will Smith and that comic and actor Chris Rock – who was on the receiving end of the Oscar night smackdown – had asked her out.
“I think every summer all the reports would come out that me and Will were getting a divorce,” she said. “And this particular summer, Chris, he thought that we were getting a divorce. So, he called me, and basically he was like, ‘I’d love to take you out.’ And I was like, ‘What do you mean?’ He was like, ‘Well, aren’t you and Will getting a divorce?’ I was like, ‘No. Chris, those are just rumors.’ He was appalled. And he profusely apologized and that was that.”
On a night when her hubby won the Best Actor Oscar for his role in the Williams sisters’ biopic “King Richard,” the honoree lost his cool after emcee Rock cracked a joke that his wife – who suffers from alopecia – looked like “G.I. Jane” and after stalking up to the stage, smacked him in the head in front of a national television audience, telling his fellow actor to “Leave my wife’s name out of your f**king mouth.”
Here’s the moment Chris Rock made a “G.I. Jane 2” joke about Jada Pinkett Smith, prompting Will Smith to punch him and yell, “Leave my wife’s name out of your f–king mouth.” #Oscars pic.twitter.com/kHTZXI6kuL
— Variety (@Variety) March 28, 2022
“I thought, ‘This is a skit,’ Mrs. Smith told People of the slap. “I was like, ‘There’s no way that Will hit him. It wasn’t until Will started to walk back to his chair that I even realized it wasn’t a skit.” The first words she uttered to Will once they were alone after the show were ‘Are you okay?’”
Jada Pinkett Smith knows everyone has been waiting 18 months for her to say something. Here it is.
In this week’s issue, Jada opens up about her marriage to Will Smith and the 2022 #Oscars incident. Pick up on newsstands Friday and read the story here: https://t.co/iXZPNQ0nAg pic.twitter.com/RNZB5nkz7e
— People (@people) October 11, 2023
Earlier this week, she made headlines while promoting her new book “Worthy” that she and Will Smith “live separately” and have been separated since 2016, years before the Oscar slap.
“I made a promise that there will never be a reason for us to get a divorce. We will work through whatever. And I just haven’t been able to break that promise,” she told “Today” host Hoda Kotb.
Pinkett Smith said that she hasn’t spoken to Rock since the slapping incident. “[Do I have] any desire to talk to Chris? Here’s my desire: I just hope that all the misunderstanding around this can be cleared up and that there can be peace.”
She also said that in her book she wrote, “there might be some misunderstanding between Chris and I as far as the 2016 Oscars. I think that he might’ve taken offense, which I meant no harm in offending. That wasn’t my intention. But I do think that there’s a big misunderstanding there.”
“We’re still figuring it out,” Pinkett Smith told People about her marriage. “We’ve been doing some really heavy-duty work together. We just got deep love for each other and we are going to figure out what that looks like for us.”
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