Controversial jokes by Chris Rock

Chris Rock is a comedian who likes to explore the boundary between a funny provocation and a tasteless insult. At the 2022 Oscars, on March 27, he got a direct response to one of his jokes. He ridiculed Jada Pinkett Smith's hair and received a punch in the face from her husband, Will Smith.

It's not the first time Chris Rock gets people riled up about his sense of humor. Have a look at his biggest controversies in this gallery.

Chris Rock became famous as a stand-up comedian with his show 'Bring the Pain' in 1996. The set had some controversial jokes in which he used the N-word to describe black people.

Later, in 2005, he told CBS '60 Minutes' that he regretted making those jokes. "Some people that were racist thought they had license to say n-----" after seeing his show, he explained. "I've never done that joke again, ever, and I probably never will."

Chris Rock didn't keep his promise though. In a recording for the HBO show 'Talking Funny' in 2011, he and the (eventually disgraced) comedian Louis CK repeatedly used the N-word and laughed about it.

Ricky Gervais and Jerry Seinfeld sat by and watched in shock. Seinfeld said "he wouldn't use the term anywhere," the Irish Mirror reports, while viewers critized Louis CK and Chris Rock for the hurtful language they had used.

In 2016, Rock hosted the Oscars and made several faux pas. First, he invited three children of Asian descent on the stage, introduced them as "Ming Zhu, Bao Ling, and David Moskowitz," and said they were 'the accountants' who had put together the Oscars' results. It sparked a lot of complaints about racial stereotypes, the Irish Mirror reports.

Well aware of the controversy, he told the audience: "If anyone is upset about that joke you can tweet about it on your phone, which was also made by these kids." Several actors of Asian descent, including Sandra Oh and George Takei, per the Irish Mirror, wrote a letter to the Academy to criticize the racism in the show.

The Oscars that Chris Rock hosted were the center of a big controversy. For the second year in a row, no people of color had been nominated for acting awards. The #OscarsSoWhite movement criticized the neglect of artists of color, but Chris Rock laughed it away.

In the Sixties, Rock told the audience, "we had real things to protest. Too busy being r*ped and lynched to care about who won Best Cinematography. When your Grandma’s swinging from a tree it's hard to really care about Best Documentary or Foreign Short." His point: things weren't that bad in 2016, so the complaints were exaggerated.

Chris Rock used to be a friend of Whitney Houston. He felt it was totally fine to make a harsh comment about the late singer's drug use in an Instagram post in 2019. On the picture, Houston looked bored, and below it, the comedy star wrote: "Hurry up I got cr*ck to smoke."

If Whitney Houston's ex-husband Bobby Brown had been anywhere near Chris Rock, he might have given him a slap in the face just like Will Smith did. Instead, Brown commented on the Instagram post: "During this time of women empowerment you chose to use your time to try and humiliate our QUEEN!!! I thought you was a friend of the family."

Also in 2019, Rock posted a photo of Betty White to explain how the gunman of a recent mass shooting "was likely to be white," the Mail Online reports. "Alongside a photo of Betty White, which sounds like 'Bet he white' when read aloud, the text read: 'The first thing people say when a mass shooting is announced.'" Readers were shocked that he made a joke about a mass shooting and also claimed he was 'racist' against white people.

After the worst of the coronavirus pandemic was over, the Oscars could finally take place in the traditional way. This means that the nominees for Best Actor, like Will Smith, could sit cosily close to the stage. It was there that Chris Rock decided to make a mockery of Jada Pinkett Smith's bald head.

"I can't wait to see GI Jane 2," he said, referring to the shaved head of Demi Moore in the film. For Jada Pinkett Smith, the comment was painful because she didn't choose to be bald. She'd lost her hair due to alopecia, a medical condition.

The Smiths and Chris Rock, who at one point had been friends (this photo is from 2005), clashed at an earlier Oscar gala when Rock made another joke about Jada Pinkett Smith.

In the midst of the #OscarsSoWhite controversy of 2016, Pinkett Smith "threatened to boycott the awards after her husband's snub for his work in 'Concussion'," the Mirror reports. During the gala, Chris Rock decided to roast the actress out of all the people who had boycotted the Oscars.

"Jada Pinkett Smith boycotting the Oscars is like me boycotting Rihanna's panties — I wasn't invited!" he said. The (mostly white) people in the audience laughed out loud, but African-American Hollywood stars were upset by the sneer, as the Mirror recalls.

In 2022, Jada and Will did get an invitation though. They sat right in front of the stage as honorary guests, with Will being an Oscar nominee. So when Chris Rock rubbed the couple the wrong way with his 'GI Jane' remark, Smith walked onto the stage and gave him a punch that will go down in Hollywood history.

TV and movie critics are wondering if the incident will have any effect on the careers of Chris Rock and Will Smith. While the latter seems to be at his summum, adding an Oscar to his trophy room, Rock seems to be past his heydays in the 90s and 2000s, when he got regular TV appearances and Grammys and Emmy awards. The only thing left is a few movie projects, such as a 2021 instalment of 'Saw' that has a 5.2/10 rating on iMDB.

In recent years, Rock often made the news because of his troubled private life. His wife Malaak Compton-Rock left him after he cheated on her, the comedian explained in the 2018 Netflix special 'Chris Rock: Tamborine.' They had been married for 16 years and have two children together.

Jokers like Chris Rock, who tend to make provocative gags bordering on insults, have spoken out about the recent phenomenon of 'cancel culture.' Rock said in 2019 that he couldn't make the same jokes that he made before. "If it was five years ago, I could say something really offensive and funny right now, but I can't do that anymore, so... hey!" the Mirror cited the comedian.

On the Breakfast Club radio show, Rock explained that he didn't think it was necessary to cancel artists for making insulting jokes. "It’s weird when you’re a comedian because when the audience doesn’t laugh, we get the message. You don’t really have to cancel us because we get the message. They’re not laughing."

What he may not have expected, is that sometimes people send a stronger message than silence alone. They may punch you in the face for your joke. That's what Chris Rock learned at the 2022 Oscars.