Comedian Chris Rock went after despised actor Jussie Smollett over the alleged hate crime hoax less than a week after the charges were dropped.
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Rock slammed Smollett while presenting an award at the NAACP Image Awards, despite being told not to mention the staged attack in any way, shape or form.
“They said no Jussie Smollett jokes. I know, I know! What a waste of light skin, you know?” said Rock, drawing laughter from the crowd. “You know what I could do with that light skin? That curly hair? My career would be outta here. Fucking running Hollywood. That’s no… What the hell was he thinking?”
He went on to make a bizarre joke about how the Empire star is no longer worthy of having a ‘u’ in his name so he’ll henceforth be referred to as ‘Jessie’, which makes sense.
“From now on, I ain’t never gonna… You Jessie from now on. You don’t even get the ‘u’ no more,” he said. “That ‘u’ was respect — you ain’t getting no respect from me.”
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Despite his jokes seemingly going over well with the crowd who responded with roaring laughter, not everyone agreed with Rock’s point of view.
It turns out he was on stage to present the award for outstanding comedy series to Black-ish, and upon presenting the trophy, actress Yara Shahidi contradicted Rock by saying, “I stand with Jussie.”
Her co-star Anthony Anderson, who also served as the night’s host, previously expressed his support for Smollett as well, telling Variety he hoped to see the nominated Smollett in attendance.
“I hope he wins. I’m happy for him that the system worked for him in his favour because the system isn’t always fair, especially for people of colour,” Anderson told the outlet. “So I’m glad it worked out for him. It’s not my place or any other person’s place to judge him or what not, but I’m glad that he’s nominated… I hope he wins because I’d be interested to hear his speech.”
Smollett was nominated for outstanding supporting actor in a drama series for Empire, though he did not win and did not attend the dinner where his category was presented on Friday nor the televised awards ceremony on Saturday.
