Will Smith Finally Talks About the Oscars Slap: ‘Hurt People Hurt People’

glamour.com:

, Smith appeared on The Daily Show with Trevor Noah to promote his upcoming film Emancipation and discuss how he's spent his year post-slap.Noah immediately turned his attention Smith's starring role in Emancipation, a slavery epic from director Antoine Fuqua about Whipped Peter—an escaped slave whose heavily scarred back was photographed and became one of the most graphic depictions of slavery, helping to galvanize abolitionists to end the institution once and for all. “Emancipation is not the kind of film we would expect to see you in as Will Smith,” said host Trevor Noah. “So, why this project?” “American slavery was one of the most brutal aspects of human history… It is hard to understand the level of human cruelty," said an emotional Smith, who had already begun dabbing tears out of his eyes before he responded. "My daughter asked me, ‘Daddy, do we really need another slave movie?’ I said, ‘Baby, I promise you, I wouldn’t make a slave movie.

This is a freedom movie.'”In , Smith and Fuqua spoke about the hazards of embodying a character like Peter. Fuqua called Smith “the nicest man in the world,” and revealed that “the movie was supposed to end in October, but we didn’t finish that movie until January,” noting that “it’s really hard to release a character who’s been brutalized and called the N-word every day.” Smith revealed that getting into character as Peter “was grueling; physically, emotionally and mentally in every way," and echoed that sentiment on The Daily Show. “This character, what he had to endure and what he had to survive, only God could make that possible,” he told Noah.

Noah eventually pivoted to Smith's incident at the Oscars, noting that it's been a long time since the public has seen Smith. “I've.