Oscar Fallout

For eight days, I’ve been distracted. It started the moment I saw Regina Hall standing up next to two big-time stand-up comics and I was forced to wrap my head around how in the world she wound up there.

Now, I’m a Regina Hall fan, but she doesn’t sell out stadiums with a tight two-hour set, so, I had to do a lot of mental gymnastics wondering who dropped out of the lineup for her to pinch-hit like that.?

My mind went to the network boardroom where Will Packer was throwing out ideas like a pitcher firing fastballs “We can get Ali Wong, Tig Notaro, or Kathy Griffin” and then he falls eerily silent because nobody’s been out at a stand-up show in two years, and he doesn’t recall any more names. For the record, Amy or Wanda alone on the stage would have been enough. Period. End of story. They’re both pros. Let’s just end that debate now.

Early on during the broadcast, I realized I needed dog food so I went down the street to Petsmart knowing I could jump back into the proceedings at any time. By the time I got back, they were still giving awards out for things I usually skip over anyway so no harm, no foul.?

I did see the slap. I also saw the Kirsten Dunst bit which was missing a crucial cutaway to Kirsten for her reaction. Amy’s bit didn’t work because without seeing Kirsten roll her eyes, it just seemed mean. I also saw that head-scratching In Memoriam which had Jill Scott standing on stage without singing a single got damn note.

Let me say this one thing real quick. We aren’t getting over that slap any time soon. There are too many ripple effects and things to unpack around it for it to just evaporate. Some people on social media are asking for us to just move on, but when you’ve witnessed something so shocking as that, you need to put words to it and share the feelings that are bubbling up inside you with as many people as you can. It is why, when someone performs a daring stunt, the first thing we do is turn to the person next to us and say, “Oh, shit! Did you see that?”?

We make sense of it by talking about it.?

I’m not a clinical expert on processing trauma, but I know I share some of the sentiments I’ve heard others express. Sadness, dismay, anger, frustration, surprise, and grief are a few that come to mind. Not just for Chris and Will, but also for the presenters, the people who got gussied up to be there, and all of us forced to bear witness.

And in our processing of what happened, we run the scenario over and over again in our minds. We wonder what would have happened if Chris had taken a step back, or if Will decided, on that long walk onto the stage, to temper his anger and return to his seat, or crack the joke we all thought was coming. What ifs keep us churning it over in our heads because it just made no sense. None.

I wondered if we had all of the information. I tried filling in the blanks on my own.?

·?Maybe this was a long-standing feud and, for Will, this was the last straw.

·?Maybe he and Chris had words just before the telecast.

·?Maybe Will knew Chris Rock was really an alien who, if he completed giving out the award for Best Documentary, the world would implode. Maybe the words “Keep My Wife’s Name Out Your F**kin’ Mouth” said twice at just the right tempo and with just the right amount of bass, were the code to ward off the alien attack.

·?Maybe the years of Scientology were just too much for Will and this was his breaking point.

·?Maybe he and Jada are making a break from the order, this was the first step, and they were supposed to meet Leah Remini outside in her limo so she could spirit them away to Thailand.

I also wondered how the hell, with all of that force coming at him, Chris Rock didn’t go down. The Rock part of Chris Rock is right. That man has a cast-iron?jaw on him. He took that slap and stood his ground.

There are so many other things wrapped up in this for all of us.?Will broke the code. He broke it with the American people, and he broke it with all of those who share the same skin color. Yes, he is just a man, but I read his book. He carefully crafted his image to become the biggest movie star of all time. He did that on his own. He made that decision and went after that as a goal. We didn’t ask him to do that.

And when he did, he agreed to act the whole part. He also put himself out there on Jada’s Red Table Talk. He wrote a book about how helpless and cowardly he felt to see his mother struck by his father. He talked about his feelings with Oprah. Why he decided that particular day, when he was about to receive the Academy’s highest award, was the day to tear it all down is unknown to me.

Perhaps being the biggest movie star in the world is too much for one human. And that’s okay. But it’s not okay to do it at the expense of someone else’s safety and well-being.

The other piece of this is the four-hundred plus years of battery at the hands of others that we still have to deal with. We are all working hard to be the best we can when the odds are always against us. Whether he meant to or not, when Will slapped Chris, he put everything we all worked hard for in jeopardy.?

It’s so painful. So heart-wrenchingly agonizing. If you need to put any of this into context, just go listen to the first few episodes of the 1619 Project. Then come back to all of this and see how you feel.

I’ve always said this country needs a giant therapy session.?All of us. All at once.?Never gonna happen, but we do.?

On a side note, the last time I flew to Montana I had a conversation with a young woman who was seated next to me. She was just returning from Syria where she had been working with women who had formerly been trafficked. I said something about PTSD and she stopped me. “PTSD,” she said “Is a western concept. In some countries, there is no P, there is only trauma. Repeated on a daily basis. Often, people going to the store for bread don’t know if they’ll ever see their family again. They live in a constant state of terror. And it rewires the brain.” She went on to say that it forces them to live every second of every day in the moment.?

It’s a kind of life we are fortunate not to have to experience.

I’m not in any way equating Syria to the Oscars. It was 100% a sidebar on something I’ve been holding close to me for a few months and finally wanted to share it. We live in a country in which having a “post” is a luxury. Eventually, we will work through the post-pandemic sadness and the Oscar affront and move on.

In the meantime, here are two colossally gargantuan things last week’s Oscars taught us. The first is that money doesn’t buy peace of mind, happiness, or love. Intellectually we know this, but we still grind away thinking that we alone will be different. If only I have that next thing, that will be it. Guess what? We all saw that concept blown to bits in a fraction of an instant. If money is your barometer for success, it’s time to recalibrate that foolishness right now. Do the work to figure out if the getting is as anywhere near as good as the giving.

The second thing has to do with achieving your dreams. Who doesn’t wonder what it would be like to stand on stage and accept an award for being the best in their field??But if accolades are where it’s at for you, you may find just as much disappointment in getting them as you do in not getting them, because tomorrow you will have to look for more to fill you up again. We all have to find a way to be okay with who we are and what we need in this life. I can’t imagine getting everything I ever wanted, and I hope I never have to. I want to dream big until the moment I draw my last breath.

My two cents? I hope we talk this shit into the ground and make sense of it so we can get back some peace of mind. We are all live wires right now, walking around in a not-quite post-pandemic world. We’re still very raw. We are sadness and heartache from the soles of our feet to the top of our heads. Carrying emotions we can’t yet put names to. Very much in need of community, and to feel safe within that community.?

I don’t know Chris. I met him once, but he wouldn’t know my face if we ever saw each other again. And I’ve never met Will. But I wish them both love and healing. I hope we give them both the space and grace to work through what happened without us getting in the way.?Most of all, I wish that for all of us, too. There’s a lot going on and we all need to recover just as much as they do. ?

Peace.