If there’s one thing Boston can't pass up on, it's drama.
That truth was crystal clear Wednesday night, when a sellout crowd stretched outside the Wilbur Theatre in downtown Boston to watch Chris Rock perform for the first time since Will Smith slapped him on live TV Sunday night at the Academy Awards ceremony.
The hit came after Rock made a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith’s bald head. Pinkett Smith, Smith's wife and an actress, has been very open about her struggles with hair loss due to alopecia.
The slap was the key to a pop culture Pandora’s Box that fell right at the intersection of discussions on violence, race, gender and the patriarchy — you know, all the topics Americans are comfortable talking about honestly and openly in a civil discourse.
Naturally, the pre-show scene outside the Wilbur was a carnival. Tickets had ballooned to hundreds and even thousands of dollars since Sunday night. Dozens of members of the press (GBH News included) hounded ticket-holders for their thoughts on the show. Members of the New Democracy Coalition used the buzz to stage a ready-made press conference to talk about violence in the Black community.
Amid all the hype, one question floated like a heavy cloud: Would Chris Rock address the slap…or turn the other cheek?
Raven Campbell got her ticket to the show the morning after the Oscars. She thought for sure that Rock would say something.
“I feel like there’s no chance that he’s not going to address what happened at the Oscars,” she said.
That feeling was shared by pretty much everyone in line. But, as it turns out, Rock didn’t have much to say at all. Onstage, he mostly stuck to his set, saying he was still processing what happened.
But as the crowd trickled its way out of the Wilbur after the show, nobody was disappointed.
Corey Gorman came to the show from Quincy. He described a crowd that had Rock’s back after one of the most shocking awards show moments ever caught on camera.
“The tone of the crowd was so supportive,” he said. “There was a lot of, ‘I love you’ s’, ‘Hey, we support you.’ And honestly, he was a good comedian. He just left it to the comedy.”
The show of love reportedly led to Rock choking up on stage. Ali and Nick Novotny were sitting near the front and saw the comedian’s reaction to the crowd up close.
“He cried,” Nick said. “And (Ali) said, ‘Is it real tears?’ We was row, like, three. It was real tears.”
It was a human moment in a week where Chris Rock, Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith have been treated as anything but.
And for someone who was smack dab in the middle of one of the biggest messes Hollywood’s ever seen, Rock cleaned up pretty nicely by all accounts.
“He didn’t have to say anything about the ‘incident,” Nick Novotny said.
“No, he didn’t,” Ali agreed. “He is what he delivers.”
