Jada Pinkett Smith has explained why she believes she took so much blame from the public after husband Will Smith infamously slapped comedian Chris Rock onstage at the 2022 Oscars.
The Red Table Talk host told People magazine in an interview published on Thursday that she thought that rumours suggesting she was the reason why her husband slapped the comic were “ridiculous”.
“But I also understood at the same time,” the actor said. “Considering the false narrative that I had cheated on Will or I was like some adulteress, Will had never done that before.”
She added: “And I think that when we just look at human nature... when you look at the breadcrumbs, people need something to blame.
“And so people not knowing what was happening behind the scenes, I surely wasn’t surprised that I got blamed.”
Jada shocked the internet this week when it was revealed that she and Will have been privately separated since 2016.
In a teaser clip for an NBC News interview, she was heard telling US presenter Hoda Kotb that the two have been living “completely several lives” for the past seven years.
Fans of the couple were not aware that the two were already separated when singer August Alsina revealed in a June 2020 interview that he had previously been in a romantic relationship with Jada.
The Girls Trip actor addressed the claim on an episode of Red Table Talk with Will the following month. She confirmed she’d had a relationship with the singer, which she infamously called an “entanglement”.
The Smiths said on that episode that they were separated at the time of her connection with Alsina. They also hinted that the King Richard actor might have had his own share of dalliances.
But many fans thought their separation was temporary, that they were back together when that Red Table Talk episode aired and that they’ve been in a committed relationship since — until this week.
Jada reportedly shares more details about her separation from Smith and the Oscars slap in her new memoir, Worthy, due out on 17 October.
The Emancipation actor spurred countless headlines after he charged the stage and slapped Chris during the 2022 Oscars after the comedian made a joke about Jada over her shaved head. Prior to that, she had been open about dealing with her hair loss for years, caused by alopecia.
Some on social media have blamed Jada for her husband’s actions, even though Will publicly stated that he made the decision to hit Chris based on his own “history” with the comedian.
“Jada had nothing to do with it,” he said in a video published on YouTube after the incident last year.
Jada told People in an interview published Wednesday that she didn’t realise what was happening when her husband slapped the Oscars presenter during the ceremony and that she initially thought it was a skit.
“I was like, ‘There’s no way that Will hit him.’ It wasn’t until Will started to walk back to his chair that I even realized it wasn’t a skit.”
The Set It Off actor also discussed some her own history with Chris, telling People that the comedian had once asked her out in the summer of 2016 following rumours swirling around at the time that she and Will were splitting up.
She said he “profusely apologized” after she told him that any reports about their divorce were “just rumours”.
