Will Smith’s reaction to Chris Rock comes after Jada Pinkett Smith has spoken about struggle with alopecia

Actor has been outspoken about her struggle with hair loss disorder

Jada Pinkett Smith has broken her silence following an altercation between her husband Will Smith and Chris Rock at the Oscars.

Smith’s reaction to Rock at the Oscars over a joke the comedian made about Pinkett Smith’s bald head came after she has spoken out about her hair loss from alopecia on numerous occasions.

On Sunday, the 94th annual Academy Awards was interrupted when Rock jokingly suggested that he was looking forward to seeing Pinkett Smith in “GI Jane 2”.

The joke did not land well with Smith, who walked onstage and proceeded to slap the comedian. After walking off stage, Smith then screamed: “Keep my wife’s name out your f**king mouth.”

The comment prompted Rock to respond: “Wow, dude. Yeah it was a GI Jane joke,” to which Smith proceeded to scream again: “Keep my wife’s name out your f**king mouth.”

After Smith apologised on Monday for his behaviour at the awards ceremony, Pinkett Smith also broke her silence, with the actor sharing a post to Instagram on Tuesday about healing.

“This is a season for healing and I’m here for it,” the post, which did not have a caption, read.

Rock’s joke about Pinkett Smith came after the Red Table Talk host has spoken candidly about her hair loss from alopecia.

In December, Pinkett Smith discussed her experience with the condition in an Instagram video, in which she pointed out a line that developed around her scalp due to the disorder.

“Now at this point, I can only laugh,” the actor said. “Y’all know I’ve been struggling with alopecia and just all of a sudden one day, look at this line right here. Look at that. So it just showed up like that and this is going to be a little bit more difficult for me to hide.”

At the time, Pinkett Smith said that she had decided to speak about the condition “so y’all are not asking any questions” and so nobody would think that she had had “brain surgery”

The video came after the actor revealed that she had decided it was time to shave her head at the urging of the couple’s daughter Willow Smith.

“Willow made me do it because it was time to let go,” she wrote in an Instagram caption in July 2021. “But... my 50’s are bout to be Divinely lit with this shed.”

Pinkett Smith first revealed that she had alopecia in 2018 during an episode of Red Table Talk, during which she recalled losing “handfuls of hair”.

At the time, the actor acknowledged that it was “terrifying” when the hair loss first started. ““And I’ll tell you it was terrifying when it first started. I was in the shower one day and then just handfuls of hair, just in my hands, and I was like: ‘Oh my God am I going bald?’” she said. “It was one of those times in my life when I was literally shaking with fear.”

Alopecia is a disease that develops when the body attacks its own hair follicles, which can cause hair loss anywhere on the body, according to the American Academy of Dermatology.

Find the full list of 2022 Oscar winners here.