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Chris Rock will finally address Will Smith’s Oscar slapstick nearly a year later as he prepares for his upcoming Netflix special.
The show, titled Chris Rock: Selective Outrage, will be the streaming service’s first live broadcast when it airs on March 4 at 9:30 p.m. ET.
Rock, 58, will be joined by Amy Schumer, Jerry Seinfeld and Leslie Jones during the presentation.
“If you’ve been waiting to see Rock on Tour address the infamous Will Smith slap situation…the comedian is waiting to tell his humorous take on his live Netflix special,” a source close to the broadcast said. Page six.
The source said Rock has been working with “veteran comedy writers” to make sure his slap jokes are “solid and funny.”
While another said: “People need to tune in to every last joke, they won’t be disappointed.”
The slap heard around the world: Smith stormed onstage on March 27 to slap his old friend after he told a sick joke about Jada Pinkett Smith.
The special will be filmed at the Hippodrome Theater in Baltimore. It airs a week before the Academy Awards on March 12.
Other comedians set to appear in the special include David Spade, Arsenio Hall and JB Smoove. NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is also scheduled to appear.
The live stream comes as Netflix begins experimenting with advertising and cracking down on password sharing. Last year, the company confirmed that they would start streaming events live.
Users who tune in late to the stream will be able to rewind to the beginning and return to the live stream. The show will also remain in the user’s Continue Watching section if they tune in while it is live.
‘Selective outrage’ is a phrase Rock has used repeatedly on recent shows when describing Smith’s slap, according to the Wall Street Journal.
A WSJ reporter said that on a warm-up show, Rock spent about five minutes on Smith and the slap, linking it between jokes about the phrase “victim” and “the dating habits of women of different ages.”
‘Chris is a very sharp commentator. That is why experts will refer to and quote things that he has said. But that’s not the same as him talking about the deepest dark feelings in him. He’s not like that,” Noam Dworman, owner of the New York City-based Comedy Cellar, told the Journal.
While a Netflix representative said the timing of the special’s airing, a week before the Oscars, is just a coincidence.
Rock came under fire after making a joke about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, that referenced the 1997 GI Jane movie in which actress Demi Moore shaved her head.
It was not clear if Rock knew that Pinkett Smith has a condition that causes hair loss.
Rock barely spoke about the slap during his Chris Rock Ego Death World Tour, which took place immediately after.
Rock barely spoke about the slap during his Chris Rock Ego Death World Tour, which took place immediately after.
After the slap, Smith yelled at Rock: ‘Keep my wife’s name out of your mouth’
Rock in shock after being assaulted on stage by Smith
Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, had recently revealed that she suffered from alopecia and had shaved her head. Rock joked during his presentation that she looked like ‘GI Jane’
During a layover in the UK, Rock addressed Will Smith’s widely criticized apology video in which the Oscar winner said: “Words hurt.”
‘Anyone who says words hurt has never been punched in the face. Will made the impression of a perfect person for 30 years, ripped off his mask and showed us that he was just as ugly as the rest of us,” Rock told the audience of him.
“There’s not a part of me that thinks that was the right way to behave at that time,” Smith said in the less than six-minute video posted online in July.
“I am deeply sorry and I am trying to be sorry without being ashamed of myself.” He told Rock, “I’m here whenever you’re ready to talk,” Smith added.
This is Rock’s second Netflix stand-up special. The first, Chris Rock: Tamborine, debuted in February 2018.
Smith also apologized to Rock’s family and especially to his mother, Rosalie, who was horrified to see her son hurt, telling US Weekly that “when he slapped Chris, he slapped us all.” She really she slapped me. Smith also apologized to Tony Rock, Chris’s younger brother.
“I didn’t realize how many people were injured at the time,” Smith said.
In the video, Smith also apologized to his family “for the heat he caused us all” and to his fellow Oscar nominees for “stealing and tarnishing his moment.”
He mentioned Questlove by name; it was the musician-director’s won documentary ‘Summer of Soul (… Or, when the revolution couldn’t be televised)’ that was cut short by the slap. Rock took the stage to present the documentary award.
Smith also said that his wife did nothing to encourage his slapping. “Jada had nothing to do with it,” she said. ‘I made a decision on my own.’
Following the altercation, the film academy banned Smith from attending the Oscars or any other academy event for 10 years.
Smith apologized to Rock in a statement after the Oscars, saying he was “out of character and wrong.”
“Sorry, it really isn’t enough,” Smith said in the video, adding that he’s hurt that he hasn’t lived up to the fans’ impressions. “Letting people down is my core trauma.”
Many had speculated that Smith would appear on camera to discuss the slap first on Pinkett Smith’s Red Table Talk online series, but he decided to do so in a video post on social media with no follow-up questions or surprise inquiries.
Earlier this month, Smith made a thinly veiled slap joke in a TikTok video.
The Emancipation star poked fun at the situation when he jumped on a TikTok trend that encourages users to ask an inanimate object what it thinks of you.
In the original video, TikToker Sam Rossi states, “This works because everything has a conscience.”
‘You can take a pen and ask him how he sees you or what he thinks of you and you will get an answer in your mind from your intuition. You can ask your car what it thinks of you, you can even ask money what it thinks of you.
In the video, Smith picks up his Academy Award for Best Actor, which he picked up that night for his role in King Richard, frowns and begins asking a question before the clip ends.
Fans were quick to notice the link between the clip and the Oscars slap, with one writing: “Hahaha that’s gold!!!!!!” while a second typed: ‘Bravo! This is classic Will Smith! This is fabulous. Hahaha Always a comedian and we adore you.’
Another wrote: ‘lol very well done. if you can’t make fun of yourself, you’re doing it wrong,” while another wrote: “Oscar: ‘Not mad…just disappointed.’
One follower wrote: ‘Redemption… This summer’s blockbuster starring Will Smith. ‘It’s not what you say, but what you do!’
A week after the slap, Rock told a crowd at Boston’s Wilbur Theater: “How was YOUR weekend?”
“I’m still processing what happened so at some point I’m going to talk about that shit,” Rock told the crowd. It will be serious. It will be fun, but right now I’m going to tell some jokes.
Rock and Chappelle backstage at their show in Liverpool on Thursday night
Rock, 57, received a standing ovation from the Boston crowd.
‘Let me be all misty and s***,’ she said, tears in her eyes. ‘I don’t have a ton of shit to say about that, so if that’s why you came here…’ she said, and paused. “I had written an entire program before this weekend.”
During a show in Los Angeles with Dave Chappelle during the summer of 2022, days before Chappelle was attacked on stage, the pair joked about the incidents.
“At least you got hit by a big name,” Chappelle said. “I got hit by the softest n****, I’ve ever rapped,” Rock responded.