The Academy lied when they claimed Will Smith was asked to leave the Oscars

Wednesday evening, the Academy issued a statement about the Will Smith-Chris Rock situation. They clarified that they are formally reviewing the matter and that several punitive measures are on the table, including expulsion (for Will alone) from the Academy and a possible ban from the Oscars for several years. At the end of their statement, they noted this: “Things unfolded in a way we could not have anticipated. While we would like to clarify that Mr. Smith was asked to leave the ceremony and refused, we also recognize we could have handled the situation differently.” It was shady. It was shady because the Academy – the judge, jury and executioner all rolled into one – cannot get their story straight whatsoever. There were journalists in the Dolby, watching and documenting what happened after the slap, and as I pointed out in yesterday’s piece, it did not seem likely that anyone from the Academy directly asked Will to leave. So… yeah, as it turns out, the Academy lied.

The Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences has claimed that it asked Will Smith to leave Sunday’s Oscars ceremony after he slapped Chris Rock. However, sources close to the situation are refuting that the actor was ever formally urged to leave the show. It appears that in the chaos that surrounded the altercation, the Academy and the show’s producer sent mixed messages about whether Smith should be expelled from the event.

In an update about pending disciplinary action against Smith on Wednesday, the organization said that Smith “refused” to leave the Dolby Theater. He went on to win the best actor award for his performance in “King Richard” later that night.

That description of events doesn’t sit well with a few individuals with knowledge of the fraught minutes following the Rock slap. They claim that some Academy members expressed that they wanted Smith removed, but they also say that no formal or explicit ask was ever made. Another person familiar with the Academy said that Smith was asked to leave through an on-site representative. That call was made by Academy president David Rubin and CEO Dawn Hudson, who, a source says, asked for Smith to leave the show instead of remaining in the auditorium for the rest of the telecast.

Show producer Will Packer, sources inside the Dolby said, was the key to Smith remaining in his seat. In the roughly 30 minutes following Smith’s attack on Rock, before the award for best actor was presented, Packer walked out into the orchestra and conferred with Smith, according to two witnesses. Packer said that he and the production “officially” wanted Smith to stay for the remainder of the show, according to one of the witnesses. Another source close to Packer denied that the producer urged Smith to remain. Packer did not respond to requests for comment. Spokespeople for Smith and AMPAS declined to comment.

Several A-listers including Denzel Washington, Tyler Perry and Bradley Cooper were seen having close conversations with Smith in the theater during commercial breaks following the slap. Cooper hugged the upset actor, while Washington and Perry reportedly consoled him. No security personnel approached the actor. When Smith accepted his award, his speech went on for several uninterrupted minutes, much longer than the time afforded to other winners.

[From Variety]

Shall I make a running list of questions I have for the Academy? First and foremost, was Chris Rock’s “GI Jane” joke ad-libbed, or was it known that he was going to say something about Will and Jada? Was the joke loaded into the teleprompter? As I said, Oscar director Glenn Weiss had the camera cued up to cutaway on Will and Jada as soon as Rock said “GI Jane,” suggesting that it was known that Rock was going to cruelly “joke” about Jada and producers were trying to start something.

Second question: who asked Will Smith to leave? Who said those words to Will? They still won’t say, and clearly the Academy is plainly lying and misrepresenting the situation. Third question: why did it take 30 minutes for Will Packer to come out and speak to Will? Was it because, as Variety reported on Monday, Packer, Geiss and Academy bureaucrats abdicated their responsibilities, failed to properly manage a crisis in real time and instead left it to actors in the room (Denzel, Tyler Perry, Bradley Cooper) to do unpaid conflict resolution?

Fourth question: after more than four days of non-stop drama, what’s it going to take for the Academy, Packer and Geiss to get their stories straight?

Photos courtesy of Instar, Avalon Red.

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24 Responses to “The Academy lied when they claimed Will Smith was asked to leave the Oscars”

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  1. Arizona says:

    they already had a camera set on Will and Jada because he’d referenced him in the Javier joke immediately before. plus it takes two seconds for them to cut to them because of how many cameras there are. and Glenn Weiss is very experienced with this. I don’t think the fact that they got a reaction shot is evidence of anything lol.

    • Mia4s says:

      Yeah, agreed I wouldn’t read anything into the cut. On YouTube you can watch “Behind the scenes Cuba Gooding Jr Oscar Speech”, the Oscar directors are incredibly fast at grabbing reaction shots. My guess it was an adlib when he saw the colour of her dress. Her dress was gorgeous, but think of the colour. I don’t think it took a genius to put together that (very poor) joke.

      The biggest issue with the Academy was what happened after and up until now. They’re embarrassed, so they’re doing stupid things. I actually think an outsider coming in to help deal with this would be wise.

  2. Tslia says:

    Denzel in that picture does not look happy.

    • HelloDolly! says:

      Of course, management leaves women and people of color to deal with difficult professional situations. Denzel is probably like wtf is happening? And why didn’t they cut to commercial immediately?

      When I was included in a racist/sexist email at my work, management suggested that part of the solution be the victims serve on a committee for diversity/equity. I literally had to say, “You don’t make the victims do the labor of the company.”

  3. Seraphina says:

    That the Academy lied does not surprise me. That is all.

  4. Eurydice says:

    At this point, I think I will officially and formally step away from this story.

  5. Brubs says:

    the joke about jada was improvised, it wasn’t there on rehearsal or on the teleprompter. the reason the cameras were already focused on Will Smith is because of the previous joke (which was obviously planned) involving Javier Bardem and Will Smith

  6. Becks1 says:

    Well, it doesn’t say it took them 30 minutes to talk to Smith, it says “IN the 30 minutes” before the award was presented, so just at any point in that 30 minute interim between the slap and the award.

    My guess is that Will Smith was never actually asked to leave, but that it was being discussed by various people (whether he should be asked or forced to leave) and then was decided he could stay. My other guess is that when Packer went to talk to him, he told Smith that he had to apologize if he won and that the academy would give him more time for his speech or something.

    This line is weird though – “that Smith was asked to leave through an on-site representative.”

    That seems to confirm that Smith WAS asked to leave, but then the rest of the article makes it sound like he was never asked to leave, so was it just that someone from the Academy contacted the “on-site representative” and said “Smith should leave” and then the request died right then?

    It’s clear the Academy had no idea how to handle the situation, which okay, this was something surprising and unexpected, but like I said yesterday, they could have cut to commercial to buy themselves some more time as soon as Will Smith got up and went to the stage.

  7. Dahlia1947 says:

    I had a feeling that it wasn’t true.

  8. girl_ninja says:

    I knew that lies and attempted cover ups would come from the academy. I’m glad Will won his first Oscar because he worked really hard for it

    To hell with the powers that be at the academy. Let’s hope Chris Rock is working towards “processing” what he needs to 🙄

  9. K says:

    Wow. I feel like we are now in JFK type situation. Who asked? What time was the question asked? Where was Gov. Connolly sitting? Jesus. Chris Rock chose to make a horrible joke about Jada on a global platform. Will Smith chose to take a long walk up to the stage and slap Chris. Most all of had to be shocked at least. I am sure the Academy all looked at each other and lost their shit and had just as many different thoughts as us. So at this point I, like Harry Potter, am over it. Rich egotistical aholes will be ok.

  10. harpervalleypta says:

    I want to know what “asked to leave” means to the Academy spokespeople. Was it “we think you should leave” or “we would like for you to go backstage”. Or was it something more wishy washy like “Would you be more comfortable leaving?” or “Do you think it would be good for you to step outside?”

    Because you can’t ask someone if they want to leave, then they say know, and then claim you “asked them to leave”.

    • Case says:

      This. Sounds to me like maybe at some point they asked his publicist if he *wanted* to leave or something, not told him to leave outright.

      No wonder the Oscars always do so poorly tbh. I love movies and award season but perhaps the reason this show can’t get its act together is because they can’t even get a story straight.

  11. grabbyhands says:

    I am zero percent surprised by this.

    Their first concern is to protect the brand and that is what they are trying and have failed to do. No one in their right mind believes that they tried to do anything constructive or professional in this matter and they will continue to throw spin at it until something sticks or people forget, whichever comes first.

    Whoever is running the ship the last few years is doing spectacularly bad job because every decision being made about the ceremony just keeps getting worse every year.

  12. MsIam says:

    Eh, let it go. I don’t think a crime wave is going to break out at the Oscars, this was a beef between two people. Next time use that 5 second delay to cut to commercials.

    • Jennifer says:

      Oh god, and now we have Kanye and the Grammys to dread….er, “look forward to.”

  13. AC says:

    This story needs to end. I can’t imagine why it’s going on so long. I know, he’s a man of color. Once again, where was the outrage when Alec Baldwin shot woman, albeit by mistake on set and then tried to strong arm her survivors?

    • Case says:

      I think a reason why this is such a huge story is because of the times we’re living in. There’s a war, there’s a pandemic. Everything is pretty bleak, and then comes along this juicy, multi-dimensional pop culture moment that happened right before our eyes. No one was seriously injured and everyone will ultimately recover career wise, which makes it easy to talk about and debate, etc. My two cents, anyway.

  14. Chantal says:

    So now, after previously lying and saying that both the Academy Prez and the CEO asked Will to leave and he refused, the Academy is now trying to throw a Black man, Will Packer, under the bus. Will Packer had done an amazing job producing this years Oscars, which flowed smoothly until the smack. In no way, shape or form should he have been the final decision maker. They are getting on my nerves with the inconsistent statements and lies. According to Whoopie Goldberg, it was being discussed whether he should leave but they were split on the decision so he stayed. If they wanted him gone, security would have removed him by the next commercial. Also, Will Smith has (had?) a lot of power in the industry. He still has some very powerful friends in the industry so the Academy has been warned – lies won’t be tolerated. This rebuttal was issued post haste! He’s messed up his career enough on his own with this. No need to pile on. But if I were Chris Rock, I’d sue Will and the Academy (esp. for the lack of response by security). They allowed him to get att*cked while he was working, did nothing to mitigate the incident (during and immediately after), and are apparently launching a CYA disinformation campaign. Even Chris stopped himself from escalating the situation by remaining calm, keeping his hands behind his back, and not going in on the Smiths and their marriage with mean jokes. He easily could have and comedians are quick with vicious comebacks. So everyone knew how to de-escalate the situation EXCEPT the people in charge? No, they kept going for the ratings (this is the most the Oscars has been talked about in YEARS!) They just weren’t expecting and don’t know how to deal with the blowback they’re rightfully receiving.

  15. Lynne says:

    I thought that his representation was approached back stage with the request that he leave rather than Will being approached, at his seat, and therefore continuing the drama in public.

  16. CatJ says:

    Someone has posted phone film from sitting behind Jada during the “event’ and it shows her clapping after the slap…. I thought it was strange……

  17. JFerber says:

    CatJ, If that’s true, I can’t blame her. Rock has been verbally abusing her for years.