Atlanta producer Will Packer came into the Oscars eager to make changes to the Oscars that he hoped would up the entertainment value, however controversial. He, of course, never imagined Will Smith slapping Chris Rock on stage for making a joke about Smith’s wife’s haircut.
His wife Jada Pinkett Smith in recent years has talked about having alopecia, an autoimmune skin disease that can cause hair loss. On Oscar night, she had her hair shorn into a buzzcut. Rock joked that she could be in “GI Jane 2,” referencing Demi Moore’s much talked-about buzzcut in that 1997 film.
Her husband took it personally, jumped on stage and slapped Rock. “Will Smith just smacked the [expletive] out of me!” Rock exclaimed, flabbergasted.
After sitting down, Smith was seen (though audio was cut out) yelling: “Keep my wife’s name out of your [expletive] mouth!”
“Wow, dude. It was a ‘G.I. Jane’ joke,” Rock replied. Smith repeated it. While the moment at first looked staged, it wasn’t. Smith was not removed from the theater but the tension hung in the air for several seconds before Rock said, “That was the greatest night in television.” He then finished reading his presentation for best documentary. (The uncensored version is available online.)
Later on stage after winning the best actor Oscar for portraying Richard Williams in “King Richard,” Smith tearfully apologized to the Academy and the nominees for his actions but specifically didn’t apologize to Rock. He also compared his defense of his family to that of Williams, the father of Serena and Venus Williams. “Art imitates life. I look like the crazy father just like they said about Mr. Williams,” he said.
That moment will definitely go down in Oscar history along the lines of Sally Field’s “You like me, you really, really like me” acceptance speech and the 2018 “La La Land”/”Moonlight” best picture snafu. At the same time, it’s hard to justify violence in the face of a bad joke. Social media reaction Sunday night largely favored Rock but Smith had his defenders as well. (Tiffany Haddish told People: “When I saw a Black man stand up for his wife, that meant so much to me.”)
As for the actual changes to the Oscars, here is a quick summary of what else happened over three hours and 40 minutes, which was pretty typical of recent Oscar telecast lengths.
Beyoncé is still the Queen: The opening on the Compton tennis courts where the Williams sisters had spent years practicing was a powerful moment where she sang “Be Alive” with a coterie of dancers and musicians. She owned the court as is her wont.
That was it about Bruno? The surprise No. 1 hit “We Don’t Talk About Bruno” from the Disney film “Encanto” was not nominated for best original song but Packer decided to give it airtime. That in and of itself wasn’t a bad idea but the execution was a mess. It opened with the actual verses of the song, then segued into Megan Thee Stallion doing a rap that was more about the Oscars itself than the film. The song, which is an ensemble tune in the movie that describes very specific details about the character Bruno, makes little sense if you haven’t seen the film. The Oscar version just repeated the chorus a lot near the end and petered out.
28th anniversary? Outside the 50th anniversary of “The Godfather,” the other three reunions seemed a bit more random, like an excuse to get the lead actors in one place: the 30th anniversary of “White Men Can’t Jump” (Wesley Snipes, Rosie Perez, Woody Harrelson), the 15th anniversary of “Juno” (Jennifer Garner, J.K. Simmons, Elliot Page) and the oddest of them all: the 28th anniversary of “Pulp Fiction.” Sure, it was nice to see Uma Thurman, John Travolta and Samuel L. Jackson together again but it seemed oddly superfluous.
Lifetime achievement award who? The Oscars chose not to highlight the Governors lifetime achievement awards this year beyond a brief mention. The winners, by the way, were Jackson, Elaine May, Liv Ullmann, and Danny Glover.
Oscars like to cart out aging actors, for better or worse: Liza Minnelli made an appearance near the end with Lady Gaga to present best picture and Minnelli’s unsteady comments and frail appearance was more uncomfortable than uplifting until Gaga said, “I got you” and Minnelli responded, “I know.”
Which of the trio of hosts held up best? Having three hosts worked well, giving each a chance to shine — or stumble. Amy Schumer had a solid opening monologue, looked patently absurd dangling in the air in a Spider-Man outfit and riffed nicely after the Smith/Rock kerfuffle. Wanda Sykes landed some solid one-liners throughout the night, looked hilarious as Richard Williams in tight white shorts and hit a few funny lines at the Oscar museum. Regina Hall had the toughest night, using her “single” status as an impressively unfunny running joke. During her dopiest bit, she announced some celebrities who had “issues” with their COVID-19 status, brought Tyler Perry, Bradley Cooper, Timothée Chalamet and Simu Liu on stage and hit on them. She then patted down Jason Mamoa and Josh Brolin in a way that was more cringeworthy than amusing. She also made a Will/Jada Pinkett joke that alluded to their “open marriage,” which they took well.
Pre-taping some of the categories worked: The eight categories that were pre-taped and re-edited featured all the winners’ speeches in full, simply cutting out presenter patter, the dramatic announcement and the time it takes for the winners to make it on stage. Many in the Academy will still hate it. In the end, it probably saved the show about 15 minutes, enabling Packer to pack in other stuff, some of it entertaining, some of it questionable.
The Twitter fan favorites were head scratching: The Twitter “fan favorite” definitely got the fans out for some unexpected films. Expected winner “Spider-Man: No Way Home,” by far the most popular movie of the year, finished in fourth behind “Minamata” (a Johnny Depp film not even available in the U.S.), the critically panned “Cinderella” and Zack Snyder’s Netflix zombie flick “Army of the Dead.”
An unusual and effective “In Memoriam”: The annual look at who died in Hollywood is usually pretty somber. This time, Packer mixed it up with a grand choir and provided three of those who died brief eulogies from celebrities who knew them. Atlanta’s Tyler Perry honored Sidney Poitier. Bill Murray provided kind words to “Ghostbusters” director Ivan Reitman. And Jamie Lee Curtis and a cute little pup provided love to the beloved Betty White, a big animal rights activist.
Blatant Disney/ABC cross promotion: BTS pre-taped a segment to name their favorite Disney movies. It’s hard to say if that was entertaining for anybody but the BTS Army.
Huh? Three extreme sports figures (Shaun White, Kelly Slater, Tony Hawk) who have almost zip to do with Hollywood popped up to honor the 60th anniversary of James Bond. That was a major stretch.
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