Will Smith slaps Chris Rock over bald Jada Pinkett joke in Oscars meltdown
Will Smith accosted Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars Sunday night for joking about his wife Jada Pinkett Smith’s bald head.
Rock took to the stage and quipped, “Jada, I love you, ‘G.I. Jane 2,’ can’t wait to see it,” but while the “King Richard” star first laughed about the joke, he immediately turned sour.
“G.I. Jane” is a 1997 movie starring a shaven-headed Demi Moore as a soldier entering the armed services.
Pinkett Smith, 50, looked furious before the censors turned on and muted Rock, 57, and Smith’s exchange. Lip readers, however, quickly realized a livid Smith, 53, shouted, “Keep my wife’s name out of your f–king mouth.”
Momentarily fazed, Rock responded, “Wow, Will Smith just smacked the s–t out of me” before defending what was “just a ‘G.I. Jane’ joke,” but the Oscar-winning actor was not having it and again screamed, “Keep my wife’s name out of your f–king mouth.”
“That was the greatest night in the history of television,” Rock remarked.
Pinkett Smith suffers from alopecia and has been vocal about her struggle with hair loss. She debuted a shaved head last summer.
“Willow made me do it because it was time to let go BUT … my 50’s are bout to be Divinely lit with this shed,” the “Nutty Professor” star wrote, reposting a selfie featuring her and her 21-year-old daughter’s matching shaved styles.
Pinkett Smith had been using scarves to conceal her head but decided to lean in and updated her fans in December about her hair-loss journey.
“Y’all know I’ve been struggling with alopecia,” she explained, adding, “look at this line right here…it just showed up like that. And this is going to be a little bit more difficult for me to hide, so I thought I’d just share it so y’all not asking any questions.”
The “Matrix Revolutions” actress first disclosed her hair battle during a 2018 episode of her Facebook Watch show “Red Table Talk,” saying, “It was terrifying when it first started. I was in the shower one day and then just handfuls of hair just in my hands … It was one of those times in my life that I was literally shaking with fear.”
Rock and the “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” star have been feuding since 2016 when the comic made a joke about Pinkett Smith boycotting the Oscars at the time over its lack of diversity.
“Jada boycotting the Oscars is like me boycotting Rihanna’s panties. I wasn’t invited,” Rock joked at the time.