Richard Williams has broken his silence to defend Will Smith, who played him in the Oscar-winning biopic King Richard, after the actor’s infamous Oscar slap.
Nearly a year after the incident, the 81-year-old father of Serena and Venus Williams shared his support for the 54-year-old woman, even saying he “didn’t feel sorry” for comedian Chris Rock, 58, who was in the event. receive the end of the strike.
Having recently recovered from several strokes and a series of health crises, Richard doubled down on his support for Will during Good Morning Britain on Monday, saying: “I’ll always support him.”
“I think he did the best he had to, but I would never dislike Mr. Smith. In fact, I thank Mr. Smith.
Asked if he saw anything wrong with what transpired at the 2022 Academy Awards, Richard said, “I don’t see anything wrong with that.”
Defense: Richard Williams has broken his silence to defend Will Smith, who played him in the Oscar-winning biopic King Richard, after the actor’s infamous Oscar slap.
Oh! Nearly a year after the incident, the 81-year-old father of Serena and Venus Williams shared his support for the 54-year-old woman, even saying he “didn’t feel sorry” for comedian Chris Rock, 58, who was in the event. receive the end of the strike
Richard also stated, “I don’t feel sorry for anyone” in relation to Chris and that “it’s time everyone forgives Will Smith.”
The tennis coach even suggested that the violence was justified by Chris’ inappropriate joke about Will’s 51-year-old wife, Jada.
“I’m 81, but when I was 51 or younger, I almost killed anybody, so I think Mr. Smith did a lot not to.”
Richard went on to call for Will’s Oscar ban to be lifted, and to close, he had a fun message for the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air star.
He joked: ‘I’ll give my message to Mr. Smith right now. Thank you very much for being so handsome, so handsome!
Chris recently unleashed a year of pent-up anger after Will slapped him across the face in his new stand-up comedy special on Saturday night.
On his live special, Chris claimed that anyone who actually knew about the circumstances surrounding the slap knew it wasn’t really about him, as he accused Will of “selective outrage”, lashing out that his wife was having an affair.
He even brought up the fact that Jada only confessed to having an affair while interviewing her husband, noting, “His wife was fucking his son’s friend.”
Controversial: Chris recently unleashed a year of pent-up anger after Will slapped him across the face in his new stand-up comedy special on Saturday night.
Chris said his ears are still ringing and he watches the I Am Legend star’s feature film, Emancipation, “just to see how emotional he gets.”
The special came just a week before this year’s Oscars.
Audience members were eagerly awaiting Chris to speak publicly about how he was slapped when he took the stage Saturday night.
Finally, after about two and a half hours, he finally brought it up to close the show.
‘You all know what happened to me, when Suge Smith slapped me. Everybody knows, everybody knows,” she began.
‘This son of a bitch beat me up at the fucking Oscars. And people say “did it hurt?” It still hurts. I’ve got Summertime playing in my ear, damn drums.
“But I’m not a victim, you’ll never see me on Oprah or Gayle crying, you’ll never see it, like, ‘I couldn’t believe it and I love Men in Black.’ No, it’s never going to happen.
“I took that punch like Pacquiao’s fucking mother,” she said, referring to Manny Pacquiao, a professional boxer.
Ouch: He even brought up the fact that Jada only confessed to having an affair while interviewing her husband, noting, “His wife was fucking his son’s friend.”
He noted that ‘Will Smith is significantly bigger than me. We are not the same size.’
Chris quipped: “Will Smith does most of his movies shirtless. You’ve never seen me do a movie shirtless. If I’m in a movie about open-heart surgery, I’m in a sweater.
‘Will Smith played Mohammed Ali in a movie, do you think I auditioned for that role? He played Mohammed Ali, I played Pookie in New Jack City. I touched a piece of corn on Pootie Tang. S*** even in animation this motherfucker [is] bigger: I am a zebra, he is a shark.
“But Will Smith practices selective outrage because everyone who knows what happened, everyone who really knows, knows that I had nothing to do with that shit. I didn’t have any tangles.
“His wife was fucking friends with his son.”
Before the storm: Will and Jada appear at the 2022 Academy Awards last year
“Normally I wouldn’t talk about this shit,” Rock said. ‘But for some reason these niggas put that shit on the internet. I have no idea why two talented people would do something so fucked up. what the fuck
‘We have all been deceived, everyone here has been deceived. None of us have ever been interviewed by the person who cheated on us on TV, like “Hey, I was sucking someone else’s ***, how did that make you feel?” Why the hell would you do that shit? she asked herself, referring to a sit-down interview Jada gave Will in 2020.
“She hurt him a lot more than he hurt me, okay,” Rock insisted, noting that after the slap: “Everybody called him a b***.”
‘I tried to call the son of a bitch and give him my condolences. He wouldn’t answer for me.
“Everyone called him a b ****,” the comedian continued. ‘And who is he hitting? Me and she know we can win. That’s some b***a**s*** thing. That I what the fuck happened, OK. I didn’t do anything to this son of a bitch.
“Years ago, his wife said he should forgo the Oscars,” Rock recounted, referring to 2016, when Jada was going to boycott the awards ceremony as part of the #OscarsSoWhite protests.
‘You shouldn’t file because your man wasn’t nominated for [Concussion], the biggest piece of shit in history. She starts it, I finish it.
‘Nobody’s messing with this bitch,’ she began. Nobody messed with her. And then this nigga give me a fucking concussion, OK What the hell, man?
“I love Will Smith, all my life I have loved this man: I saw him open for Run DMC at the Nassau Coliseum. I’ve supported Will Smith my whole life and now I watch Emancipation just to see him scream. He made me support Masa.
‘A lot of people say ‘Chris, why didn’t you do anything in return?’ Because I have parents for that, because they raised me, “she concluded.
And do you know what my parents taught me? Don’t fight in front of the whites.
The Other Man: Jada had admitted to having an affair with singer August Alsina in an episode of her web series with her husband in 2020 (pictured in 2017)
Jada had admitted to having an affair with singer August Alsina in an episode of her web series with her husband in 2020.
He explained that he first met August through his son Jaden, recalling that the singer, who would have been 23 at the time, was “really sick.”
Jada said: ‘And it all started with him just needing help, me wanting to help his health, his state of mind.
“Our family’s outpouring for him was initially for his health,” she told her husband. “We found all these different resources to help you get ahead, and from there, you and I were going through a very difficult time.”
At the time, Will admitted, “I’m done with you,” while Jada added that they decided to break up for a “period of time.”
“And then what did you do, Jada?” Will asked, urging his wife to keep talking.
“As time went on, I got into a different kind of tangle with August,” Jada explained.
The mother-of-two responded to August’s claim that Will gave her “permission” to have an affair.
“The only person who can give permission in that circumstance is myself,” she insisted.
“But what August was probably trying to communicate because I could see how he could see it as permission because we were amicably separated, and I think he wanted to make it clear that he’s not a homewrecker, because he’s not.”
When Will pressed Jada to clarify what he meant by “entanglement,” she replied, “It was a relationship, absolutely.”
Jada continued: ‘I was in a lot of pain and was very broken. In the process of that relationship I definitely realized that you can’t find happiness outside of yourself.’
Hilarious: Chris said his ears are still ringing and he watches the I Am Legend star’s feature film, Emancipation, “only to see him scream.”
Several years later, at last year’s Oscars ceremony, Chris poked fun at Jada’s hair loss, commenting that it looked like she was preparing for a role in a GI Jane sequel.
While Will could originally be seen laughing, when the cameras turned back to Rock, he took the stage and slapped the comedian across the face.
The actor then returned to his seat and began yelling at Rock from his table, chastising him with the now infamous “keep my wife’s name out.” [of] your fucking mouth!
The artist subsequently received substantial backlash from much of the entertainment industry for his conduct during the award ceremony.
Ultimately, Will was banned from attending any Academy related events for 10 years.
Good Morning Britain airs Monday to Friday from 6am on ITV1 and ITVX.