If comedian Chris Rock wants people to know one thing about “the slap heard around the world,” it’s that he can take a blow just like Manny Pacquiao.
Rock, 58, finally hit back at Will Smith during his livestreamed Netflix standup special, Chris Rock: Selective Outrage on Saturday night, a year after the infamous Oscars slap.
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The comedian told the crowd at the Hippodrome Theatre in Baltimore that he was going to do his best to perform standup “without offending nobody.”
“I’m going to try my best, because you never know who might get triggered,” he joked. “People always say words hurt. Anybody who says words hurt has never been punched in the face.”
During last year’s Oscars ceremony in March, Rock was slapped by Smith after he made a G.I. Jane joke about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, who suffers from the skin condition alopecia. Smith shouted for Rock to “keep my wife’s name out of your f–-ing mouth!”
Smith later apologized for slapping Rock. The actor was banned from the Academy Awards for 10 years.
On Saturday, Rock, who has mostly avoided commenting on the Oscars slap, said the whole world watched as he “took that hit like Pacquiao.”
“You all know what happened to me, getting smacked by Suge Smith,” Rock said, referencing former record executive Suge Knight, who pleaded no contest to armed robbery and assault with a firearm in 1995. “It still hurts. I got Summertime ringing in my ears.” (The song Summertime was released by Smith and DJ Jazzy Jeff in 1991.)
“But I’m not a victim, baby,” he said. “You’ll never see me on Oprah or Gayle crying.”
In the profanity-laden segment, Rock said he’d always admired Smith before
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Will Smith
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Chris Rock