Will Smith’s infamous slap of Chris Rock at last year’s Oscars has led the Academy to craft a crisis team for anything it “many not anticipate” ahead of this year’s ceremony in March.
Bill Kramer, CEO of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, revealed to Time magazine that the organization has installed a “whole crisis team” for the ceremony after Smith’s reaction to a joke about his wife Jada Pinkett Smith was subject of criticism and led to his resignation from the Academy –– and ban from attending the Oscars –– in early 2022.
“We have a whole crisis team, something we’ve never had before, and many plans in place,” Kramer said.
“We’ve run many scenarios. So it is our hope that we will be prepared for anything that we may not anticipate right now but that we’re planning for just in case it does happen.”
Kramer added that the slap opened up the Academy’s mind to what could occur during the Oscars.
“But these crisis plans — the crisis communication teams and structures we have in place — allow us to say this is the group that we have to gather very quickly. This is how we all come together. This is the spokesperson. This will be the statement,” he said.
“And obviously depending on the specifics of the crisis, and let’s hope something doesn’t happen and we never have to use these, but we already have frameworks in place that we can modify.”
Kramer’s comments come after Academy president Janet Yang recently described the Academy’s response to the slap as “inadequate.”
“We learned from this that the Academy must be fully transparent and accountable in our actions, and particularly in times of crisis you must act swiftly, compassionately and decisively for ourselves and for our industry,” Yang said.
“You should and can expect no less from us going forward.”
Photo by Robyn Beck / AFP) (Photo by ROBYN BECK/AFP via Getty Images
The Academy is set to have Jimmy Kimmel take the helm as Oscars host in its first post-slap ceremony on March 12.
Kramer, in his interview with Time, described Kimmel as knowing how to deal with live TV and a live audience.
“That’s why you want someone like Jimmy on stage who is used to dealing with live TV: Things don’t always go as planned. So you have a host in place who can really pivot and manage those moments,” Kramer said.
Kramer’s look at the impact of the slap arrives in the same week as Smith making light of the moment on TikTok.
Smith, who embarked on an “apology tour” over the slap, picked up his Oscar after another TikTok user indicated that people can pick up any object and ask it what it thinks of them.
You can watch Smith’s TikTok below.