Chris Rock: Who is the comedian Will Smith slapped at the Oscars?

When Chris Rock She appeared on a September 25, 1995 episode of “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” wearing a cheetah-patterned dress and using a blonde wig to try to seduce her. Will Smith probably never imagined that almost three decades later the same actor would slap him publicly and before the eyes of the world at the ceremony of the Oscar .

The incident, still the talk of the entire entertainment press, shows in a strange way how far this comedian, born in the town of Andrews, South Carolina, on February 7, 1965, and raised in an upper-class suburb, has come. Brooklyn worker.

The eldest of eight brothers, Chris revealed that he suffered from ‘bullying’ as a child. “We lived in Bed-Stuy, one of the most famous ghettos in the world”, the comedian told BET in 2014. “My mother and father wanted me to go to a better school, so they sent me to a poor white neighborhood… I was the only black kid in my class for most of the time. He was also a little boy, a skinny dwarf”.

The comedian noted that it was this experience that defined him for the rest of his life and It gave him the mental quickness and ambition that served him to succeed later.

Looking for your own rock

At 17, Rock dropped out of high school to start doing stand-up comedy in various New York clubs. It was in one of those places, called Catch a Rising Star, where the young comedian managed to catch the eye of the already famous Eddie Murphy, who became his mentor and gave him his first film role with a minor role in the movie “Beverly Hills.” Cop II” (1987).

In 1990 Chris Rock entered “Saturday Night Live”, a seed program for great comedians. In the three years he was on the show he interacted with future stars like Chris Farley, Rob Schneider, David Spade and Adam Sandler, but by 1993 differences with the direction the show was taking, as well as his attempts to turn him into the next Eddie Murphy, led him to decide to go to “In Living Color”, a show with a predominantly African-American cast where Rock was sure he was going to be the future of comedy. Unfortunately for the comedic actor, the show was canceled in May 1994, a few weeks after he joined it.

“The culture is changing and I am not part of it. This shit is getting hipper This shit is getting blacker This shit is getting more rapperChris Rock said in an interview with Marc Maron for the “WTF” podcast. “‘SNL’ is still a pretty white show. When they hired me I was the first black guy in about eight years – and In ‘Living Color’ was cool. (…) I wanted to be in an environment where I didn’t have to translate the comedy I wanted to do”.

An example of the kind of comedy that Chris Rock wanted to do was his film “CB4” (1993), which he starred in and co-wrote. The film, a spoof of gangsta rap group like NWA, more than tripled its initial budget of six million.

Bringing the pain (and the fame)

But it was his HBO comedy specials that really launched Rock to stardom, beginning with 1994’s “Big Ass Jokes,” and in particular 1996’s “Bring Up the Pain.” “N***** vs Black People”, crystallizes the humor of the comedian: critical of society, self-referential and open-minded, no matter who he offends.

After this the rise of Chris Rock could not stop. In addition to launching two more specials titled “Bigger & Blacker” (1999) and “Never Scared” (2004), the comedian also had his own talk show titled “The Chris Rock Show” where he spoke with some of the biggest stars. greats of the time like Adam Sandler, Whoopi Goldberg, Jay-Z and, more relevant now, Jada Pinkett-Smith.

His Hollywood career also received a new boost, starring in and writing for comedic films such as “Down to Earth” (2001) and “Pootie Tang” (2001). The comedian also explored other facets of film, directing and starring in the films “Head of State” (2003) and starring opposite Anthony Hopkins in the thriller “Bad Company” (2002).

2005 was a particularly busy year for Rock, who not only starred opposite Adam Sandler in the sitcom “The Longest Yard,” but also launched his hit autobiographical show “Everybody Hates Chris” and lent his voice to the animated film by computer “Madagascar”, where Jada Pinkett also participated.

that year too was invited for the first time to conduct the Oscar ceremonyshowing not only that this gala has tried everything to raise its ratings, but that at that time Chris Rock had become a milestone for Hollywood.

Ups and downs

Already one of the most recognized African-American actors in Hollywood, Chris Rock continued to carry out his own projects such as the romantic comedy “I Think I Love My Wife” (2007) and the documentary “Good Hair” (2009), focused on women’s hairstyles. African Americans. In 2010 he acted in “Death at a Funeral” and collaborated with Sandler again with the film “Grown Ups” and its sequel in 2013.

In 2015, he released “Top Five”, a film directed, written and starring by himself that touches on autobiographical themes, as he is a comic actor who seeks to make a transition to more serious films. The film, in which Kevin Hart and Rosario Dawson also act and in which Adam Sandler, Whoopi Goldberg, DMX and Jerry Seinfeld appear as cameos, is considered one of Chris Rock’s best productions.

A year later, the comedian is once again invited to host the Oscars. The year was particularly relevant, not only because of the racial tension in the country after the prominent death of several African-Americans before the police forces, but because Hollywood and the Academy itself were criticized for the lack of African-American nominees for the acting categories.complaints that crystallized in the ‘hashtag’ #OscarSoWhite.

Despite being called upon to boycott the ceremony by other African-American celebrities, Chris Rock ultimately retained his role as host, and during that year’s monologue he deeply addressed the issue of racism within the mecca of cinema. “Is Hollywood racist?“, I ask. “Without a doubt, Hollywood is racist.”. However, the comedian pointed out that the racism of the movie mecca is closer to the rivalry between university brotherhoods than to the one that “burns crosses”, in clear reference to the Ku Klux Klan.

And while his appearance at that ceremony was well received, it was not without its mistakes, including a prank involving three Asian children that was deemed in poor taste by members of this community.

It was also there that he made a joke at the expense of Jada Pinkett that many point to as part of the reason why Will Smith was so quick to go for the fists this year, saying: “Jada says she’s not coming. Is she in any TV series? Is she going to boycott the Oscars? Jada boycotting the Oscars is like me boycotting Rihanna’s panties. I wasn’t invited. That’s not an invitation I’d turn down, but I get it, I’m not hating”

after the laughter

The last few years have been times of change for Chris Rock, who in 2018 released his stand-up special “Tamborine”, his first in a decade, and where he reveals dark details of his failed marriage such as his infidelities.

“The fault is mine, because I’m a fucking idiot. I didn’t listen. I wasn’t nice. He had an attitude, he thought: ‘I pay for everything; I can do what I want’. That s*** doesn’t work. I believed the man“, it states.

His latest projects have been focused more on serious acting. Thus, in 2020 she starred in the fourth season of the television series “Fargo” and produced and acted in the reboot of the “Saw” franchise entitled “Spiral” (2021).

It was this version of the actor, far from his peak and already closer to 60 than 50 years old, who attended the ceremony on March 27 to present the category of Best Documentary. Far from acidic commentary on current political situations, Rock followed up the already Oscar-approved script with a couple of bland jokes. Her only spark of originality came when she saw her former friend and co-star Jada Pinkett and came up with the inappropriate comparison to “GI Jane,” prompting her husband Will Smith’s disproportionate reaction. .

While everyone is talking about the incident and the humiliation suffered by the comedian, Chris Rock has seemed to prefer to stay away from the cameras in recent days. But this is a situation that he will not be able to maintain for long, since this March 30 he is scheduled to perform a series of shows at the Wilbur Theater in Boston which serve as a prelude to his new world tour, the appropriately titled “Ego Death World Tour”, meaning the death of the ego. Tickets, as expected, are sold out.