Whoopi Goldberg claimed that officials at Sunday night’s Academy Awards had chosen not to remove actor Will Smith from the venue — after he slapped comedian Chris Rock over a joke about his wife — because they did not want to have to explain the fact that they were kicking out a black man.
Goldberg, who has hosted the Oscars herself on several occasions, began her explanation on Tuesday’s broadcast of “The View” with Rock and the reasons she believed no one jumped up to make sure he was all right.
“The reason no one got up to go comfort Chris is because they weren’t going to let anybody else on the stage. They were not going to —” she said, adding, “I’m going to tell you the rest of it. Let me finish with this part. They weren’t going to let anybody go back. There were people there for Chris. Everybody is aware.”
WILL SMITH APOLOGIZES TO CHRIS ROCK: The actor apologized for slapping comedian Chris Rock following a joke he made about wife Jada Pinkett Smith at the #Oscars — #TheView panel weighs in after Smith’s mother spoke out saying she was “surprised” by his behavior. pic.twitter.com/j1Vana6eAX
— The View (@TheView) March 29, 2022
“The reason people got up and went over to him is because I think a lot of people thought, Oh my God, is he having a break? And so do we need to get him out? What do we need to do?” she said of Smith then, going on to suggest that if they had taken Smith out immediately, it would have complicated matters.
“The reason they didn’t go and take him out is because that would have been another 15 — 20 minute explanation of why we’re taking the black man out five seconds before they’re about to decide whether he’s won an Oscar or not,” Goldberg continued. “So that’s, and I’m going to say I believe Will Packer made the right decision. He said, let’s get through the rest of this so we can deal with it wholeheartedly. So that’s what went on. This is not the first time craziness has happened on stage, but this is the first time we’ve seen anybody assault anybody on stage.”
Sunny Hostin argued that Rock was still being victimized, noting that video of what happened was going to be out there forever.
“We need to also talk about Chris Rock because what’s playing over and over again is his assault,” she said. “Internationally on television, his family is seeing that, his children are seeing that … he was the victim.”
Comedic actor Jim Carrey took the opposite approach, saying that he was “sickened” by the “spineless” Hollywood audience for not only allowing Smith to stay but for giving him a standing ovation as if nothing had happened when he was announced best actor — for “King Richard” — a short time later. He also said that if he were Rock, he’d be filing a lawsuit against Smith.