How to handle Will Smith’s slap is just one of many crises facing academy after Oscars
LOS ANGELES — If it’s true — as Denzel Washington told Will Smith moments after Smith strode onstage at the 94th Oscars and slapped Chris Rock across the face — that the devil comes for you at your highest moment, then motion picture academy officials must be wondering what Satan does when you’ve hit rock bottom.
The academy hoped Sunday’s Oscars would be a morale-boosting celebration of movies for a troubled film industry. Instead, the show has done further damage to the already battered image of the nearly century-old organization and opened up a host of thorny new problems for its already divided leadership.
The academy’s board, which includes such Hollywood notables as Steven Spielberg, Ava DuVernay and Laura Dern, will be meeting Wednesday night to sift through the rubble.
Smith’s violent outburst engulfed the evening in controversy, overshadowing everything else, leading academy leaders to already call one emergency meeting the next day to review the incident amid members’ calls to discipline the actor, who won the Oscar for his lead work in “King Richard” shortly after striking Rock.
The academy subsequently
