“I’m not a victim” – Billboard

Chris Rock has teased around the elephant in the room a lot over the summer on his current Rock Hart Only Headliners Allowed tour with Kevin Hart, dropping a few punchlines here and there on the one thing everyone wants to hear. go deep.

But during his set at the PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, New Jersey on Sunday, Rock reportedly made one of the most specific references yet regarding his feelings after Will Smith attacked him onstage at this year’s Oscars.

“Anyone who says words hurt has ever been punched in the face,” Rock, 57, said during his set, according to WE Weekly, citing an anonymous eyewitness to the set. Rock also reportedly later referred to Smith – who has kept a low or non-existent profile since the incident – as “Suge Smith”, apparently a reference to the currently disgraced former Death Row Records CEO and strongman. imprisoned, Marion “Suge” Knight.

The magazine reported that later, during a discussion of overly sensitive people playing the victim, Rock said, “I’m not a victim, motherfucker,” saying he “got rid of that shit and went back to work”. Now don’t get me wrong, Rock said, “Yeah, that hurts, motherfucker. But I shook that shit off and went to work the next day…I don’t go to the hospital for a paper cut.

Rock hit stages across the country with Hart more than four months after Academy Award-winning Smith stormed the stage at the 2022 Oscars and slapped the comedian hard in the face after Rock made a G.I. Jane joke about Smith’s wife, actress Jada Pinkett Smith’s bald hairstyle. Pinkett Smith suffers from alopecia, an immune disorder, which can lead to severe hair loss.

A night earlier, during a show in New York’s Madison Square Garden on Saturday, Hart dragged his own elephant, a goat, in effect, to praise Rock as the greatest stand-up of all time. But of course, he also joked that the name of the farm animal wearing a gold chain was “Will Smith”, right before the hoof “is on Chris’s shoes”.

Rock has teased the subject before, joking during a show at London’s Royal Albert Hall in May: “I’m fine, if anyone is wondering. I regained most of my hearing. Smith later apologized to Rock and resigned from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. In April, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences banned Smith from attending Academy events for a period of 10 years.