Did comedian Chris Rock apologize - as of March 28, 2022 - to actress Jada Pinkett Smith after making a joke about her hair at the Oscars? No, that's not true: Although actor Will Smith, Pinkett Smith's husband, apologized to Rock for slapping him onstage at the award show for the joke, Rock did not apologize for the joke.
The claim appeared in a tweet (archived here) on March 28, 2022. The tweet was a reply to another tweet from the Twitter account of video game and entertainment website IGN that announced Smith's apology to Rock. The reply tweet read:
and Chris rock apologies to jada, hopeful they all caan hug it out move on from this story
This is what the post looked like on Twitter on March 29, 2022:
(Source: Twitter screenshot taken on Tue Mar 29 14:37:31 2022 UTC)
In an email to Lead Stories on March 29, 2022, a spokesperson for Rock responded to our inquiry about the apology by simply saying:
It's fake
Lead Stories also looked on Rock's website and his official Facebook, Instagram and Twitter accounts to attempt to locate any apology to Pinkett Smith. We did not find any apology.
Lead Stories also clarified a claim that alopecia "literally means male or female pattern baldness," which was a claim made in response to Rock's joke. That fact check can be found here.
