Will Smith posts apology video for slapping Chris Rock at Oscars ceremony in March
- Smith – who went on to win the best actor award – marched on stage and hit Rock for making a joke about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith
- ‘Chris, I apologise to you. My behaviour was unacceptable. And I’m here, whenever you’re ready to talk,’ Smith said in the nearly six-minute video
Actor Will Smith has posted an emotional new apology for slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars earlier this year, revealing in a lengthy video clip that he has reached out to the comedian who was not yet “ready to talk.”
Smith – who went on to win the best actor award – marched on stage and hit Rock for making a joke about his wife, in an incident that overshadowed the March ceremony, being broadcast live around the world.
“Chris, I apologise to you. My behaviour was unacceptable. And I’m here, whenever you’re ready to talk,” Smith reiterated in the nearly six-minute video, in which he also answered fans’ questions about the shocking moment that has tarnished his public image.
Smith had made a public apology just after the incident, and was banned from attending the Oscars for the next 10 years after the slap.
The 53-year-old also resigned his membership with the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences – although the organisation did not revoke his best actor award for “King Richard”.
In the video posted to social media on Friday, Smith said his wife, actress Jada Pinkett Smith, who was seated next to him and grimaced as Rock joked about her, said nothing to prompt his attack.
“I made a choice on my own,” he said, apologising also to Pinkett-Smith and the couple’s children “for the heat that I brought on all of us”.