TRANSCRIPT:
MICHAEL TAMSURIYAMIT, REPORTER:
From the red carpet pre-show to the no-mask audience, this year’s 94th Academy Awards made a triumphant return to Hollywood’s biggest stage.
And no one was more excited than the actors and actresses whose work we were there celebrate that night, but before we can get to that, we need to address the elephant in the room, which was an impromptu joke made by comedian Chris Rock.
And the events that happened right after.
In case you missed it, no your ears are not lying to you. That was the sound of actor Will Smith slapping Chris Rock in the face after the comedian made a joke about his wife’s baldness.
And for many viewers who tuned in to watch the scene unfold, they were quick to point out Smith’s wrongdoing.
JONATHAN KOGAN, VOX-POP TALENT:
Well, first and primary impression was that Will Smith made a big mistake, and he let his emotions get the better of him.
VIVIANA ALLAHAM, VOX-POP TALENT:
Smith shouldn't have done that. I feel like he could have handled that maturely and not slap Chris Rock. That was out of character in a sense.
DANA KALDY, VOX-POP TALENT:
I just felt like it was very machismo. It wasn't authentic, it was just Will Smith going, “No, my marriage is going great. Let me go protect Jada by slapping this man,” which like shouldn't have happened.
MADISON SIMON, VOX-POP TALENT:
I feel like they should have just removed him. That was just like, a really awkward situation, and I feel like it took away from the Oscars like it made it not as fancy, because like people act their best during the Oscars. It really messed up the Oscars as a whole, like just as a picture.
TAMSURIYAMIT:
Others were also critical of Chris Rock for joking about Jada Pinkett Smith’s lack of hair, which is a result of her battle with the autoimmune disorder, alopecia.
KALDY:
The G.I. Jane joke, to be honest, it went over my head, like I didn't even understand it, I had to Google it, I didn't get it, but the joke shouldn't have been made.
SIMON:
As a woman, I like my hair, I like my long hair – it gives me my personality. And if something’s out of my control, and I keep losing my hair due to the illness that I have, I'd have a lack of confidence in myself. So, if someone points that out in front of a whole bunch of people that I'm around and on TV, I would be embarrassed.
SARIAH LEWIS, VOX-POP TALENT:
People think that alopecia is just, oh, you lose your hair. It's an autoimmune disease. You get hospitalized for it, it's not just losing your hair. So to make jokes about it, when you aren't even friends with them is crazy.
MICHAEL ALVAREZ, VOX-POP TALENT:
At first, I didn't understand what was the joke or why was it so offensive. But after hearing from my close friends that it's because of Will Smith's wife having hair cancer, it kind of like pulled me back away from the memes.
TAMSURIYAMIT:
Controversy aside, there was still so much to celebrate that night, and for 21-year-old Allison Cachay Narva, that would watching her role model, Ariana DeBose, become the first queer woman of color to win “Best Supporting Actress,” for her 2021 role as Anita in “West Side Story.”
ALLISON CACHAY NARVA, MAIN TALENT:
I love Ariana DeBose, like she's so talented. And she was in theater, she was in Hamilton before all of this – she was on Broadway. So to even just get there I know is a huge hurdle to people who identify as Latina.
TAMSURIYAMIT:
And when asked whether DeBose’s historic win was outshined by the night’s unexpected events, Cachay Narva says DeBose is a queen who needs no introduction.
CACHAY NARVA:
I will always want people to sing the praises of Ariana DeBose because she's amazing. Obviously, everything with Will Smith and Chris Rock was quite the thing to watch, but in terms of overshadowing, I think her work speaks for itself. I think nothing can diminish the work that she's done.
TAMSURIYAMIT:
Even host Amy Schumer helped lighten the mood and steer the show back on track, in what was truly a night honoring the accomplishments of actors and actresses like DeBose.
Regardless of what went down last weekend, the consensus among people seems to be that this year’s Oscars was definitely one to remember. But, how you remember it, well, that’s up to you.
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*NOTE*: Cover image provided by Walt Disney Television via Flickr under the Attribution-NoDerivs 2.0 Generic (CC BY-ND 2.0) License.
Original Photo: flic.kr/p/jeFLVr
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