LOS ANGELES — First-time Oscars producer Will Packer has shed more light on the immediate aftermath of that infamous Oscars slap. Appearing on "Good Morning America" on Friday, Packer explained what happened behind the scenes after "King Richard" star Will Smith slapped comedian Chris Rock on Sunday, then returned to the stage an hour later to accept his lead actor Academy Award.
The show, which Packer co-produced with Shayla Cowan, was dubbed by this newspaper as "the most chaotic Oscars in history." And Packer apparently agreed, saying that he too thought that Smith and Rock had staged a bit that wasn't scripted.
"I said, 'Watch this, he's gonna kill.' Because I knew [Rock] had an amazing lineup of jokes that we had — we had them in the [Tele]Prompter — and ultimately he did not get to one joke. He didn't tell one of the planned jokes. He was just immediately freestyling," Packer said on "GMA," which airs on ABC, the same network as the globally televised Oscars.
