“I just…”- Serena Williams breaks silence on Will Smith slapping Chris Rock for cracking jokes about Jada Pinkett’s hair


“I just…”- Serena Williams breaks silence on Will Smith slapping Chris Rock for cracking jokes about Jada Pinkett’s hair

Serena Williams, Will Smith hitting Chris Rock

Former World No. 1 Serena Williams along with sister Venus and the entire Williams family had a fantastic day at the Oscars as ‘King Richard‘, the biopic drama on Richard Williams, father and coach of the Williams sisters won an Oscar. Will Smith, who portrayed the titular role, went on to win the Oscar in the ‘Best Actor’ category.

ADVERTISEMENT

The movie that was released in 2021 turned out to be both a commercial and critical success for bringing the story of the Williams family and how Richard’s grit and determination saw Serena and Venus conquer the whole tennis world. Smith hitherto had been nominated on multiple occasions for the category but was unable to win one, but his wait of nearly 3 decades finally ended at the Oscars 2022.

The ceremony however was tarnished by a sudden loss of temper for Smith who went up to the stage and slapped host Chris Rock for remarks made on Smith’s wife Jada Pinkett Smith. While the others in the room enjoyed the act of Rock taking digs on some of the film industry colleagues, a remark by Chris on Jada’s hair loss did not go well with Will who went up to the stage and hit Chris on the face while screaming on his way back to the seat, “Keep my wife’s name out of your fuc**ng mouth”.

Venus and Serena both were in the audience as they were also meant to be presenters for an award later on. However, with the Will-Chris incident taking place, Serena was speechless showing her reaction through her Instagram story. In the next story, she could not fathom much and just said, “I just sat down,” before some cheers and claps from the back covered her sentence.

ADVERTISEMENT

Will Smith thanks Venus and Serena Williams in his acceptance speech

Venus Williams, Serena Williams, Will Smith
Venus Williams, Serena Williams, Will Smith

On winning the prestigious award, Will made sure that he thanked everyone for their help and efforts. The list included the entire cast and crew of the movie King Richard and the American also made sure to thank the entire Williams family for their trust that he could give justice to the role of Richard Williams in the drama.

Will however did not make any comments regarding his incident with Chris and just made a sly remark at the end saying, “Hopefully the Academy calls me back next year.” With speculations arising on what action will the Academy take on Will for his actions, it will be a wait-and-watch situation if Will is fined or stripped of his award or denied entry/nomination ever again as he broke the code of conduct at the Academy Awards.

Also Read: ‘I have to and will learn from this,’ Victoria Azarenka apologizes for storming out mid-match against Linda Fruhvirtova at Miami