The Oscars slap was an unscripted moment at the most scripted event of the year

There isn’t exactly a playbook for how to react when the Best Actor nominee and eventual winner slaps one of the Oscar presenters in the face. Even the Academy seems to be struggling, writes Clémence Michallon

The slap: Will Smith hits Chris Rock (AFP via Getty)

I almost didn’t watch the Oscars this year. It’s not that I specifically planned to avoid the ceremony but I had family in town, we went out to dinner and by the time I came home, only a few trophies were left to dish out. So I did what any reasonable person would have done: I switched on the TV and checked Twitter to see what I had missed.

And that’s how I learned about the slap.

In case you missed it: towards the end of the ceremony, Will Smith stepped onto the Oscars stage and walked up to Chris Rock, who was presenting the Oscar for Best Documentary Feature. Rock had just made a poor taste joke about Jada Pinkett Smith, making fun of her closely cropped hair. (She suffers from alopecia, a condition that causes hair loss.) Smith slapped Rock in the face, then returned to his seat, from which he instructed the comedian to “keep my wife’s name out of your f****** mouth”.) Literal minutes later, Smith won the Oscar for Best Actor and gave an acceptance speech.