Source: Boston Globe / Getty
Comedian Chris Rock made his first public appearance on stage since the infamous confrontation with Will Smith at the Oscars, and he referenced it briefly to the eager audience.
According to the Boston Globe, Rock began the first night of his tour on Wednesday night (March 30th) at The Wilbur theater having to calm down the packed house. ”Let me do the show! Let me be all misty and s***,” he yelled out after the crowd’s boisterous applause. As they settled down, he began with: “How was your weekend?”
There were people in the crowd who clamored for Rock to address the slap that he received from Will Smith at the Academy Awards on Sunday night after he made a joke about the actor’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Rock brushed it off. “I don’t have a bunch of s*** about what happened, so if you came to hear that, I had like a whole show I wrote before this weekend. And I’m still kind of processing what happened, so at some point I’ll talk about that s***. And it’ll be serious and it’ll be funny, but right now I’m going to tell some jokes.”, he said.
The show was the first of two that evening and marks the first of six dates that Rock has in Boston as part of his “Ego Death” tour. As the second show got underway, Rock again made a reference to the events of Sunday night saying, “I haven’t talked to anyone, despite what you heard.” Ticket prices for the shows have skyrocketed, according to reports.
The fallout from the altercation is still boiling over. The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences announced that they’ve initiated ‘disciplinary proceedings’ against Smith over his actions. There have also been reports that they asked the King Richard actor to leave and he refused to do so. The Academy also apologized to Rock explicitly: Mr. Rock, we apologize to you for what you experienced on our stage and thank you for your resilience in that moment. We also apologize to our nominees, guests, and viewers for what transpired during what should have been a celebratory event.”
