Will Smith says his "deepest hope" is that his infamous Oscars slap does not have an effect on the team behind his new film Emancipation in the upcoming awards season. The Hollywood actor said he understood if people were "not ready" to have him make a comeback at the 2023 awards circuit, but that the film’s production team should not be "penalised".
During the annual awards show in March of this year, Smith stormed the stage and slapped Chris Rock after comments the comedian made about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Moments later he returned to the stage after winning the best actor Oscar for his role in the biopic King Richard, about the father of Venus and Serena Williams.
Smith later apologised to Rock and the Academy for the incident, but was banned from attending any Academy events or programmes for 10 years. Emancipation marks the actor’s first big-screen project since the incident, and he discussed the potential effects of the controversy in a recent interview with Washington DC’s Fox affiliate, Fox 5.
