20 Devastating Oscars Moments Hidden In Plain Sight
16. Will Smith's Slap Hijacks The Night
How many Oscar moments prove so shocking that they have their own Wikipedia page?
At the 2022 Oscars, Will Smith infamously took the stage and slapped host Chris Rock in the face for making a joke about his wife Jada Pinkett Smith's shaved head - a result of her suffering from alopecia.
The insanity of an Oscar nominee - and eventual winner later that night - assaulting the host is one thing, but the wider, mostly unspoken tragedy of The Slap is that it basically derailed the rest of the night's proceedings.
After all, how many of us can remember which film won Best Picture that year?
It was CODA, by the way, but the underdog drama's against-the-odds victory was entirely overshadowed by Smith's act, which itself is destined to be remembered until the heat death of the universe.
The fact that CODA and all of the night's post-slap winners became a historic footnote behind Smith's scandalous conduct is the real shame of it all, honestly.