Will Smith issued another groveling apology to Chris Rock on Friday and revealed his former friend still hasn’t forgiven him for slapping him on-stage at the Oscars.
Smith said he’d taken the last three months to ‘work’ on himself and realized now how many people he hurt when he smacked Rock on stage at the awards.
‘I’ve reached out to Chris and the message that came back is that he’s not ready to talk when he is, he will reach out. So I will say to you, Chris, I apologize to you. My behavior was unacceptable and I’m here whenever you’re ready to talk.’
He also apologized to Rock’s mother and his entire family, specifically Rock’s mother and his younger brother Tony.
‘I just didn’t realize how many people got hurt in that moment, so I want to apologize to Chris’s mother. I want to apologize.
‘I want to apologize to Tony Rock… Tony Rock was my man and this is probably irreparable,’ he said.
He also apologized to Jada Pinkett Smith, his wife whose honor he claimed to be defending with the outburst, and said she had ‘nothing to do with it’.
‘I spent the last three months replaying and understanding the nuances and the complexities of what happened in that moment.
‘I’m not going to try to unpack all of that right now but I can say to all of you, there is no part of me that thinks that was the right way to behave in that moment.
‘There is no part of me that thinks that’s the optimal way to handle a feeling of disrespect or insults.’
Rock, who was hosting the show, joked that Smith’s wife Jada looked like ‘G.I. Jane’ because of her bald head.
She had recently revealed that she suffers from alopecia.
Smith stormed the stage and slapped Rock after fuming: ‘Keep my wife’s name out of your f*****g mouth.’
He went on to win Best Actor for his role in King Richard that night, but he did not specifically apologize to Rock.
Insisting that his wife had nothing to do with the slap, he went on: ‘I made a choice of my own from my own experiences from my history with Chris.
‘Jada had nothing to do with it. I’m sorry, babe.
‘I want to say sorry to my kids and my family for the heat that I brought on all of us.
‘To all my fellow nominees, this is a community.
‘It’s like, I won because you voted for me and it breaks my heart to have stolen and tarnished your moment.’
Smith went on to claim that ‘disappointing people’ is his ‘central trauma’.
‘I can still see Questlove’s eyes. You know it happened on Questlove’s award. You know, it’s like.
‘I’m sorry really isn’t sufficient.
‘Disappointing people is my central trauma. I hate when I let people down so it hurts.
‘It hurts me psychologically and emotionally to know I didn’t live up to people’s image and impression of me, and the work I am trying to do is I am deeply remorseful.
