Richard Williams defends Will Smith over Oscars slap trends now
Richard Williams has broken his silence to defend Will Smith, who portrayed him in the Oscar-winning biopic King Richard, after the actor's infamous Oscars slap.
Almost one year on from the incident, the father of Serena and Venus Williams, 81, shared his support for the 54-year-old and even claimed he 'didn't feel sorry' for comedian Chris Rock, 58, who was at the receiving end of the strike.
Having recently recovered from several strokes and a series of health crises, Richard doubled down on his support for Will during Monday's Good Morning Britain, saying, 'I'll always stand by him.
'I think he has done the best thing he needed to do, but I would never be disgusted with Mr Smith. Matter of fact, I appreciate Mr Smith.'
When asked if he saw any wrongdoing in what occurred at the 2022 Academy Awards, Richard said, 'I don't see nothing wrong with that.'
Defending: Richard Williams has broken his silence to defend Will Smith, who portrayed him in the Oscar-winning biopic King Richard, after the actor's infamous Oscars slap
Ouch! Almost one year on from the incident, the father of Serena and Venus Williams, 81, shared his support for the 54-year-old and even claimed he 'didn't feel sorry' for comedian Chris Rock, 58, who was at the receiving end of the strike
Richard also stated, 'I don't feel sorry for no one,' in relation to Chris and that 'it's time for everyone to forgive Will Smith'.
The tennis coach even suggested the violence was justified because of Chris's inappropriate joke about Will's wife Jada, 51.
'I'm 81-years-old but when I was about 51-years or younger, I almost killed any damn one, so I think Mr Smith done a great deal not to.'
Richard went on to call for Will's Oscars ban to be lifted and, in closing, had an amusing message for The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air star.
He joked, 'I'll say my message to Mr Smith right now. Thank you very much for being so good-looking, so handsome!'
Chris recently unleashed a year of pent-up rage after being slapped across the face by Will in his new stand-up comedy special Saturday night.
In his live stand-up special, Chris claimed that anybody who really knew about the circumstances surrounding the slap knew that it wasn't actually about him — as he accused Will of 'selective outrage,' lashing out because his wife had an affair.
He even brought up the fact that Jada only confessed to having an affair while interviewing her husband and noted: 'His wife was f****** her son's friend.'
Controversial: Chris recently unleashed a year of pent-up rage after being slapped across the face by Will in his new stand-up comedy special Saturday night
Chris said he still has ringing in his ears and watches the I Am Legend star's feature film, Emancipation, 'just to see him get whooped.'
The special came just one week before this year's Oscars.
Audience members were eagerly waiting for Chris to publicly speak about getting slapped across the face as he took the stage Saturday night.
Finally, after about two and a half hours, he finally brought it up to close out the show.
'You all know what happened to me, getting slapped by Suge Smith. Everybody knows, everybody f****** knows,' he began.
'I got smacked at the f****** Oscars by this motherf*****. And people are like "Did it hurt?" It still hurts. I got Summertime ringing in my ear f***** drums.
'But I'm not a victim, you will never see me on Oprah or Gayle crying you will never see it, like, "I couldn't believe it and I love Men in Black." No, it's never going to happen.
'I took that hit like Pacquiao mother f*****,' he said, referring to Manny Pacquiao, a professional boxer.
Ouch: He even brought up the fact that Jada only confessed to having an affair while interviewing her husband and noted: 'His wife was f****** her son's friend'
He noted that 'Will Smith is significantly bigger than me. We are not the same size'.
Chris joked: 'Will Smith does most of his movies with his shirt off. You've never seen me do a movie with my shirt off. If I'm in a movie getting open heart surgery, I'm in a sweater.
'Will Smith played Mohammed Ali in a movie, you think I auditioned for that part? He played Mohammed Ali, I played Pookie in New Jack City. I played a piece of corn in Pootie Tang. S*** even in animation this motherf****** [is] bigger: I'm a zebra, he's a shark.
'But Will Smith practices selective outrage because
