Jimmy Kimmel is hosting the Oscars a year after the famous slap, and he talked a lot about it, making it a joke.
The late-night comedian has been doing a lot of press in the weeks leading up to the big gig, and he has been asked many times about Will Smith hitting Chris Rock and how he’ll talk about it. Kimmel talked about the Oscars slap from last year in his opening monologue, and he did it just the way most people thought he would: with a joke, a jab, and a warning.
His opening comments didn’t avoid the elephant in the room, and it took JK a while to get to the slap because he first made fun of other stars, but when he did, he went in.
Jimmy made fun of the showrunners from 2022 by saying that they had a crisis team ready for tonight but that if something terrible did happen, he expected them to do the same thing they did last year: nothing. He even joked that if someone hurt someone else this time, they would get the Best Actor award, a stage to speak from, and a hug.
Kimmel mentioned the slap again when he talked about all the nominated Irish actors this year, joking that there could be another fight. The whole joke made many people laugh and seemed to go over well. He didn’t say Will or Chris’s names, but he didn’t have to. He made his point and did it with humor.
He also said they want people to feel safe and that violence will not be tolerated. He then added a lot of stars as possible protection in case someone tried to hurt him because they didn’t like one of his jokes. He said any would-be attacker would have to get past Michelle Yeoh, Michael B. Jordan, Andrew Garfield, Pedro Pascal, Steven Spielberg, and others if they wanted to fight on stage.
A few days ago, when preparations were still going on, Kimmel made another joke about the carnage, referring to the color of this year’s walkup. He said, “Is there going to be trouble this year?” Adding, “We’re sure hoping not. But if there is, I think the fact that we chose a champagne carpet instead of a red carpet shows how sure we are that there won’t be any bloodshed.
As for the crisis team, AMPAS hired many people to “deal” with any crazy things that might happen. JK says he doesn’t know about it and doesn’t know how they plan to carry out their plans or how they will get rid of him if things go wrong.
It’s strange how much Jimmy has been making fun of the slap, and you can bet that the producers have given their approval. All in all, it was a good strategy, and hopefully, this puts an end to the whole thing.
Here’s the moral: Everyone should keep their hands to themselves for the rest of the night because the movies, not the fights, should be the focus of the show.