Ricky Gervais, known for burning celebrities as a frequent host of the Golden Globes, said he would not have joked about Jada Pinkett Smith’s bald head at the Oscars. So Will Smith’s slap of Chris Rock would not have happened, he concluded.
“I’ll get it out of the way,” he said at a show in London, via the Mirror. “I have not got any Will Smith material. I trended when that happened, and I was not even there.”
“What has it got to do with me? People were going, ‘What would have happened if Ricky Gervais had been doing it [presenting an Oscar award)]?’” he continued. “Well, nothing, as I would not have made a joke about his wife’s hair. I would have made a joke about her boyfriend.”
Gervais was referring to Jada Pinkett Smith’s “entanglement” with rapper August Alsina, which she revealed in 2020. While Will Smith hinted last year that he and his wife had an open marriage, the couple said they were separated at the time of Jada Pinkett Smith’s dalliance with Alsina.
Gervais, however, is no stranger to jokes about alopecia, Jada Pinkett Smith’s hair loss condition. At the Oscars on Sunday, Rock made a “G.I. Jane” dig about it and an offended Will Smith hit him in the face onstage in a stunning TV moment.
Gervais joked at his recent show that he might change his tour name from “Armageddon” to “Alopecia,” the Mirror reported.
Gervais could be considered somewhat of an expert on dishing out political incorrectness to a celebrity crowd. Watch him eviscerate Hollywood during his fifth Golden Globes hosting gig.