Jada Pinkett Smith is speaking out about how the public reacted to her in the wake of her estranged husband Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the 2022 Academy Awards ceremony.
In an interview with People shared Thursday, Jada vented that ‘It was ridiculous in how far it went.’
The 52-year-old actress-turned-talk show host — who admitted this week that she had been separated from her husband Will for an astounding seven years — said that her previous admission in 2020 to having a ‘relationship’ with August Alsina led people to falsely accuse her of cheating.
That alleged misconception then made her an easy target for blame over the shocking on-stage slap, which was preceded by a joke Chris made about her buzzed hair cut, which was in response to her hair loss brought on by alopecia.
‘But I also understood at the same time. Considering the false narrative that I had cheated on Will or I was like some adulteress, Will had never done that before,’ Jada said of responses to herself and her husband.
Opening up: Jada Pinkett Smith, 52, has shared her reacting to being blamed for her husband Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the Oscars in 2022; seen in March 2022 in Hollywood
Misinformation? Jada claimed that the blame went too far, and she said she was incorrectly called an ‘adulteress’ for admitting to having a relationship while she and Will were separated; Will and Chris Rock seen at the 2022 Oscars
‘I think that when we just look at human nature… when you look at the breadcrumbs, people need something to blame,’ she continued.
‘And so people not knowing what was happening behind the scenes, I surely wasn’t surprised that I got blamed,’ Jada added. ‘But I understood that that’s just the human nature of it all.’
Will has been on the same page as his wife ever since his violent outburst on live television, and he has been adamant that she shares no blame in his actions.
He was even more explicit in a video from July of 2022, several months after the controversial ceremony, in which he stated that she didn’t tell him to do something about Chris’ joke.
‘It’s like… I made a choice on my own from my own experiences, from my history with Chris. Jada had nothing to do with it,’ he declared. ‘I’m sorry, babe. I want to say sorry to my kids and my family for the heat that I’ve brought on all of us.’
Jada first confessed her dalliance with August Alsina, a singer 21 years her junior, during a blockbuster episode of her Red Table Talk series, in which her husband was her guest.
During the talk, she made the shocking admission that she had carried on some sort of relationship with August, though she claimed that it did not count as an ‘affair.’
However, she also claimed that Will had never given his blessings for the relationship, as the couple were separated at the time.
Taking the blame: ‘And so people not knowing what was happening behind the scenes, I surely wasn’t surprised that I got blamed,’ Jada mused. ‘But I understood that that’s just the human nature of it all’
His fault: Will clarified after the fact that Jada wasn’t to blame for the slap, and he said that she didn’t ask him to do something about Chris’ joke about her shaved head, which was in response to hair loss from alopecia; seen at the 2022 Oscars
August himself claimed that the Men In Black star had approved of the relationship, which Jada said was false.
In her People interview, Jada claimed that she was so surprised by Will strutting up to the Oscars stage to slap Chris that she assumed it was a skit that they had come up with ahead of time and kept secret for maximum shock value.
It wasn’t until she could see her husband’s face afterward that she realized there wasn’t anything funny about the slap.
‘I was like, “There’s no way that Will hit him,”‘ she said. ‘It wasn’t until Will started to walk back to his chair that I even realized it wasn’t a skit.’
She added that her first words to Will after the conclusion of the show were, ‘Are you OK?’
Jada also spoke about her connection to Chris Rock in her People cover story.
The two had had tense interactions in the wake of the 2016 Academy Awards ceremony.
She had called for the show to be canceled in the wake of the #OscarsSoWhite controversy, and in his Netflix comedy special from earlier this year, Chris claimed to his audience that Jada had urged him to drop out of the gig in solidarity with protests over the Academy failed to nominate more Black performers and artists.
However, she admits now that she was not ‘really recognizing the level of pressure [Chris] might’ve been under’ at the time.
Cut off: Jada said that Chris tried to apologize to her after Will slapped him at the Oscars, but she cut him off and has not spoken to him since then; seen at the 2016 Oscars
She added that his ‘feelings might have been hurt,’ and she said she should have given him a call to clarify her feelings.
Jada said that the comedian came down to the audience shortly after the slap and the end of his awards presenting to apologize to her, when she recalled him saying, ‘I didn’t mean you any harm.’
But she said that she replied, ‘I can’t talk about this now, Chris. This is some old s***,’ and, confusingly, she claimed to have cut him off because she thought he was referring to tensions with her and Will from the 2016 show, as well as unspecified issues he and her husband had going back to the 1980s, rather than the slap that occurred minutes earlier that viewers across the world had seen.
She added that she had not spoken to him since she cut off his apology at the 2022 Oscars.
