Jada Pinkett Smith Says Chris Rock Asked Her Out on a Date amid Rumors She and Will Were Divorcing

 

Jada Pinkett Smith hasn’t spoken to Chris Rock since the Oscars incident, but she hopes everyone involved can find “peace.”

The actress, whose book Worthy is out Oct. 17, tells PEOPLE in a candid new interview that “no, I haven't talked to Chris” since the March 27, 2022, when her husband Will Smith struck him onstage at the Oscars after taking issue with a joke made about Jada.

“[Do I have] any desire to talk to Chris? Here's my desire: I just hope that all the misunderstanding around this can be cleared up and that there can be peace,” she adds.

“I talk about this in the book, I think that there might be some misunderstanding between Chris and I as far as the 2016 Oscars. I think that he might've taken offense, which I meant no harm in offending. That wasn't my intention. But I do think that there's a big misunderstanding there,” says Jada, 52.

Back in 2016, when Will was overlooked for his Concussion performance and the acting nominations recognized no actors of color, Jada was vocally in support of the #OscarsSoWhite movement, calling for a boycott of the award show.

Chris, who was hosting that year, made jokes about Jada in his monologue. And, in his Netflix comedy special earlier this year, Chris claimed that Jada told him he should quit the hosting gig out of solidarity.

Jada admits to “not really recognizing the level of pressure [Chris] might've been under” at the time.

“I probably should have called him and gone, ‘Hey, are you okay? And just know that although I'm speaking out about the Oscars, I do wish you the best and I just want you to know that,’ me taking the time to have called him and said that, just to touch base. But his feelings might've been hurt,” she says.

But, Jada adds, “All we can ever do is just look at our part and see where could I have done something that would've seemed as if... Whatever misunderstanding might've been created, what could I have done to avoid that misunderstanding? The one thing that I think about is that call.”

Jada says Chris, 58, called her afterward in 2016 and she thought they’d moved on.