Yesterday was wild - Will Smith slapped Chris Rock at the Oscars for cracking a joke on Jada Pinkett Smith's alopecia. The Men In Black actor walked up on stage and slapped the comedian in front of a live audience, and millions of online viewers.?
Now, just like with everything else, Twitter has a theory about what caused Rock's bad luck. No, it isn't toxic masculinity at its finest (Yes, it is.)
According to Twitter users, the Madagascar actor said, "Macbeth". Now, what is the deal with that word? Turns out that according to an old superstition, one must never utter the name of the Shakespeare character in a theatre, except to perform or rehearse a line from the play.?
Instead, the monarch must be addressed as "the Scottish King" or "the Scottish Lord", and the work itself as "the Scottish play". If these rules are not followed, destruction follows.
According to multiple viewers, the moment when Smith slapped Rock (almost sounds like a Friends episode name), happened almost immediately preceded by the comedian mentioning Macbeth.
¡°Denzel!¡± Rock said from the stage to Denzel Washington, who appeared last year in Joel Coen¡¯s film adaptation of the Shakespearean tragedy.?
¡°Macbeth! Loved it!¡±
Will Smith was awarded his first Oscar win moments after the slap for his performance in King Richard.?
The incident has been the only topic trending on social media since yesterday. While some people condemned Smith for choosing violence, others supported him for defending his wife's honour.
Some users on Twitter said that Rock did this to himself.?
¡°To be fair, Chris Rock put a hex on himself by saying ¡®Macbeth¡¯ in a theater,¡± wrote one user.?
¡°Keep¡ Macbeth¡¯s name¡ out of your F***ING mouth,¡± another tweeted.
Chris Rock has reportedly declined to press charges.
The Scottish play has proven to be responsible for a long history of mishaps - in 1849, the audience at one performance in New York City broke into a violent riot and killed at least 20 people.
In another fateful incident in 1937, Laurence Olivier was playing the monarch when a weight somehow got loose and fell on the stage, crashing just inches from him. In 1953, Charlton Heston was performing the Scottish King's role, and his tights caught fire, ending in severe burns.? ??
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