Oscars: Will Smith 'punches' his way to victory with Best Actor trophy

Hollywood star Will Smith ended his dry run at the Oscars as he lifted the best actor trophy for “King Richard” minutes after he punched comedian Chris Rock for making a joke about his wife Jada Pinkett-Smith.

The punch will go down in the Oscars history as one of the wildest moments after the 2017s mix up when “La La Land” was mistakenly named as the best picture instead of “Moonlight”. The confrontation took place after Rock joked to Smith that he was looking forward to a sequel to G.I. Jane, Pinkett-Smiths movie.

The full list of winners at the 94th Academy awards:

Best Picture: “CODA”

Best Actress: Jessica Chastain, “The Eyes of Tammy Faye”

Best Actor: Will Smith, “King Richard”

Best Director: Jane Campion, “The Power of the Dog”

Best Original Song: “No Time to Die”

Best Documentary Feature: “Summer of Soul”

Best Adapted Screenplay: “CODA”

Best Original Screenplay: “Belfast”

Best Costume Design: “Cruella”

Best International Feature: “Drive My Car”

Best Supporting Actor: Troy Kotsur, “CODA”

Best Animated Feature: “Encanto”

Best Visual Effects: “Dune”

Best Cinematography: “Dune”

Best Supporting Actress: Ariana DeBose, “West Side Story”

Best Film Editing: “Dune”

Best Score: “Dune”

Best Sound: “Dune”

Best Production Design: “Dune”

Best Makeup and Hairstyling: “The Eyes of Tammy Faye”

Best: Documentary (Short Subject): “The Queen of Basketball.”

Best Short (Animated): “The Windshield Wiper.”

Best Short Film (Live Action): “The Long Goodbye.”

The actor strode up to the stage and slapped Rock. When he sat down, Smith was heard shouting “keep my wife’s name out of your f***ing mouth.” The actor referenced the incident his emotional acceptance speech, summing it up as “love will make you do crazy things”. “I’m being called on in my life to love people and to protect people and to be a river to my people… You got to be able to take abuse, you got to be able to have people talk crazy about you. In this business, you got to be able to have people disrespecting you and you got to smile and you got pretend like that’s okay. Thank you Denzel (Washington), who said to me a few minutes ago… he said, at your highest moment, be careful, that’s when the devil comes for you.”

#badboys3 #gijane2 #willsmith #chrisrock #oscars #besttvever

Can't believe what I just saw live on screen pic.twitter.com/YiijPRQENt

— Guy Springthorpe (@GuySpringthorpe) March 28, 2022

The actor thanked tennis stars Venus and Serena Williams for trusting him with the story of their father. “I just hope they didn’t see that on TV. I want to say thank you to Venus and Serena and the entire Williams family for trusting me with your story. That’s what I want to do. I want to be an ambassador of that kind of love and care and concern. I want to apologise to the academy. I want to apologise to my all my fellow nominees.”

It was third time lucky for the 53-year-old star who was previously nominated in the same category twice — “Ali” and “The Pursuit of Happyness” — but couldn’t go all the way. In the category, Smith was up against Benedict Cumberbatch of “The Power of the Dog”, Andrew Garfield of “Tick, Tick… Boom!”, Javier Bardem of “Being the Ricardos” and Denzel Washington of The “Tragedy of Macbeth”.

The 94th Academy Awards were held in Los Angeles on March 28 after a gap of two years lost to the pandemic.

Earlier, Denis Villeneuve’s “Dune”, which is nominated in 10 categories, won early Oscars for the best sound, best editing, best cinematography, best score, best production design and best visual effects in the controversial pre-taped announcement by the Academy this year.

The Academy had decided to pre-tap eight of this year’s Oscars categories, also including documentary short, makeup/hairstyling, production design, animated short, live-action short and sound. Mac Ruth, Mark Mangini, Theo Green, Doug Hemphill and Ron Bartlett were the winners for “Dune” in the best sound category, which also had nominations from “Belfast”, “No Time to Die”, “The Power of the Dog and West Side Story.

Legendary composer Hans Zimmer, who is known for scoring most of the Christopher Nolan’s films, walked away with the best original score trophy for “Dune”. The other contenders in the category were Nicholas Britell for Don’t Look Up, Germaine Franco for Encanto, Alberto Iglesias for Parallel Mothers and Jonny Greenwood for “The Power of the Dog. Joe Walker nabbed the trophy for best editing for “Dune”, beating out films such as Don’t Look Up, King Richard, The Power of the Dog and Tick, TickBoom!.

The film also won in the production design category ahead of Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, The Tragedy of Macbeth and West Side Story. Greig Fraser won the best cinematography award for “Dune”, which was nominated alongside Nightmare Alley, The Power of the Dog, The Tragedy of Macbeth and West Side Story in the category. The film also picked best production design award for Zsuzsanna Sipos and Patrice Vermette, and best visual effects for Paul Lambert, Tristan Myles, Brian Connor and Gerd Nefzer. The best makeup and hairstyling award went to The Eyes of Tammy Faye. In the best documentary short subject category The Queen of Basketball emerged as the winner.

The best animated short film Oscar was won by The Windshield Wiper. The nominees in the category were Affairs of the Art, Bestia, Boxballet and Robin Robin. The best live action short film Oscar was won by Riz Ahmed and Aneil Karias “The Long Goodbye”.

Actor-dancer Ariana DeBose was named the best supporting actress for her performance in Steven Spielberg’s adaptation of the iconic Broadway musical “West Side Story”.

DeBose was a frontrunner as the winner after she bagged all major precursor awards in the best supporting actress category, including a Golden Globe, a SAG Award, and a BAFTA.

Japanese drama “Drive My Car”, an adaptation of celebrated writer Haruki Murakami’s short story by director Ryusuke Hamaguchi, won the best international film trophy. “Drive My Car” bested fellow nominees “Flee” from Denmark, “The Hand of God” from Italy, “Lunana: A Yak in the Classroom” (Bhutan) and “The Worst Person in the World” from Norway.

“CODA” star Troy Kotsur scripted history as he became the second deaf person to win the best supporting actor trophy at the Oscars. His win comes more than 35 years after his co-star Marlee Matlin won an Oscar for lead actress for Children of a Lesser God (1986). Kotsur dedicated his win to the deaf, disabled and “CODA” community. “It is amazing to be here. I cannot believe that I am here. Thank you to the Academy for recognising my work,” an emotional Kotsur said through an interpreter of the American Sign Language in his acceptance speech.

(With inputs from agencies)