Everything Chris Rock has said about getting slapped by Will Smith at the 2022 Oscars

On March 27, 2022, Will Smith slapped host Chris Rock across the face at the 94th Annual Academy Awards.

Moments after Rock made a joke that poked fun at Jada Pinkett Smith's shaved head, Smith walked onto the stage and slapped Rock across the face. Pinkett Smith has alopecia and has publicly spoken about losing her hair to the condition.

"Wow, Will Smith just smacked the s--- out of me," Rock said immediately afterwards.

Returning to his seat, Smith then called out, "Keep my wife's name out of your f---ing mouth."

After winning the best actor award for "King Richard" shortly after the incident, Smith gave a tearful apology, saying, "Love will make you do crazy things."

The following day, he also issued an apology to Rock, saying his own actions had been "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," Smith wrote on Instagram. "I would like to publicly apologize to you, Chris. I was out of line and I was wrong."

He resigned from the Academy and was banned from attending the Oscars for 10 years.

Pinkett Smith also addressed the incident in a June episode of her Facebook show, "Red Table Talk," saying she hoped the two men could reconcile.

Backstage, Rock immediately responded to the situation with a joke, reportedly telling a producer, "I just took a punch from Muhammad Ali."

Oscars producer Will Packer spoke to Rock backstage immediately after the slap. Packer told "Good Morning America" that Rock had still been in "joke mode" when he walked off stage.

"I said, 'Did he really hit you?' and he looked at me and goes, 'Yeah, I just took a punch from Muhammad Ali.' He was immediately in joke mode but you could tell that he was very much still in shock," Packer said in an interview that aired April 1, 2022.

The quip was in reference to Smith's role as boxer Muhammad Ali in the movie "Ali," for which he was nominated for a best actor Academy Award in 2002.

Days later, while performing in Boston, Rock told his audience that he was "still processing" the incident.

"I'm still processing what happened," Rock said to his audience at the Wilbur Theater on March 30, 2022, according to Us Weekly. 

Rock made sure to stick to his script during his show. According to The Guardian, he told his audience that he "did not have a lot to say" about the Oscars.

"I had like a whole show I wrote before this weekend," he added in an attempt to draw attention away from the event.

In April 2022, at a surprise appearance at Comedy Cellar in New York City, Rock refused to speak about the incident, telling the audience to "lower your expectations."

"Lower your expectations. I'm not going to address that s---,'" Rock said to a crowd in New York City less than two weeks after the Oscars, an audience member told Page Six.

The audience member added that Rock joked that "all the sudden people cared about his early shows."

Later that month, Rock joked he would only discuss the incident if he got paid to do so.

According to The Palm Spring Desert Sun, during a show at Fantasy Springs Resort Casino in Indio, California, Rock said, "I'm not talking about that until I get paid."

In May 2022, Rock told a London audience that he'd discuss the slap at a later date on Netflix.

According to The Telegraph, when Rock performed in London, he suggested he'd speak on the topic in the future.

"Don't expect me to talk about the bulls---," he told the crowd at the Royal Albert Hall.

"I'll talk about it at some point — on Netflix," he said.

He once again joked about wanting compensation for speaking publicly about the incident, saying, "Your tickets were expensive, but not that expensive."

In August 2022, Chris Rock said he'd declined an offer to host the 2023 Academy Awards — he likened returning to the show to Nicole Brown Simpson "going back to the restaurant."

While performing in Phoenix, Arizona, Rock told his audience that he was asked to host the 95th annual Academy Awards in March 2023. 

According to the Arizona Republic, Rock said he rejected this offer, suggesting it would be like returning to the scene of the crime. He joked that asking him to return to the Oscars was like asking Nicole Brown, OJ Simpson's ex-wife, to return to the restaurant where she left her glasses before she was killed.

Nicole Brown Simpson's sister, Tanya Brown, called the joke "distasteful."

In July 2022, Rock told a crowd in New Jersey, "I'm not a victim."

According to Variety, while performing in Holmdel, New Jersey, Rock admitted that getting slapped by Smith hurt.

"Anyone who says words hurt has never been punched in the face," he said.

However, he added, "I'm not a victim. Yeah, that s--- hurt, motherf---er. But I shook that s--- off and went to work the next day. I don't go to the hospital for a paper cut."

In his new Netflix special, which was released on March 4, the comedian finally addressed the incident head-on, saying it "still hurts."

Almost a full year after the 2022 Oscars, Rock addressed the slap during a live show in Baltimore that was taped for his Netflix comedy special "Selective Outrage."

"Y'all know what happened to me, getting smacked by Suge Smith," Rock said.

"People are like, 'Did it hurt,'" he said. "It still hurts!  I got 'Summertime' ringing in my ear."

"But I am not a victim, baby," he added. "You will never see me on Oprah or Gayle crying."

Later in the special, he referenced the Smiths' marriage, suggesting that marital struggles were the cause of Smith's physical outburst. In 2020, Pinkett Smith confirmed she'd had what she called an "entanglement" with singer August Alsina during a breakup in her marriage to Smith. The Smiths addressed it in an episode of "Red Table Talk."

"His wife was [having sex with] her son's friend. I normally would not talk about this s---, but for some reason, [they] put that s--- on the internet," Rock said in the comedy special. 

"We've all been cheated on. None of us have ever been interviewed by the person we cheated on on television. She hurt him way more than he hurt me," he added. 

The Smiths have not publicly responded to his comments.