Chris Rock breaks silence on why he didn't hit Will Smith back at Oscars

Chris Rock finally broke his silence on the famous Oscars slap in his new stand-up special, revealing why he didn't hit Will Smith back.

Although the comedian has addressed the incident, which unfolded at the 2022 Academy Awards, this is the first time he's spoken about it in any depth.

And what better way to do so than in his Netflix special Selective Outrage last night (4 March), where he left the audience hanging until the end of the performance.

"Y'all know what happened to me," he says, adding, "I got smacked at the f***ing Oscars by this motherf***er.

"People are like, 'Did it hurt?' It still hurts. I got 'Summertime' ringing in my ears."

Taking a dig at Smith's reaction to his outburst, which saw him get banned from the Academy Awards for 10 years, Rock said: "I'm not a victim, baby.

"You will never see me on Oprah or Gayle, crying. You will never see it, never gonna happen... I took that hit like Pacquiao."

Reuters/Alamy Stock Photo

In a great bit of self-deprecating humour, he goes on to highlight how much bigger Smith is than him.

"I know you can't tell on camera - Will Smith is significantly bigger than me," he says.

"We are not the same size, okay? Will Smith does movies with his shirt off. You've never seen me do a movie with my shift off.

"If I'm in a movie getting open heart surgery, I've got on a sweater. Will Smith played Muhammad Ali in a movie."

After ripping into the actor and his wife Jada Pinkett Smith, including her 'entanglement' with her son's friend, the comedian says that he 'rooted for Will Smith' his whole life.

"And now, I watch Emancipation just to see him get whooped," he jokes, referencing Smith's film in which he plays a slave who escapes captivity and goes to fight with Abraham Lincoln's army during the American Civil War.

As for why he didn't hit the King Richard star back (other than the fact that he's bigger than him), Rock explains: "Because I got parents, that's why. Because I was raised, okay? I've got parents, and you know what my parents taught me?"

"Don’t fight in front of white people," he replies before dropping the mic.

Netflix

Fans have been raving about the performance on Twitter, with one describing the mic drop moment as 'powerful'.

Another said: "Someone call the police. Chris Rock just killed Will Smith onstage."

"Chris Rock does it again," commented a third, while a fourth chimed in: "Chris Rock ended that show with the realest thing we heard so far this year."