"Love will make you do crazy things."
Amidst all the excitement over Will Smith slapping Chris Rock in the face for making a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith's alopecia, it's worth remembering that Will Smith also won an Oscar tonight for Best Actor for his performance as Richard Williams in 'King Richard'.
Naturally, the incident has overshadowed that as well as everything else from the night. Anyway, fighting back tears and his voice somewhat trembling, Will Smith opened his Oscar speech by saying that the real-life Richard Williams, the role which won him an Oscar, was "a fierce defender of his family".
Smith went on, describing how he "protected" his fellow cast members Aunjanue Ellis, Saniyya Sidney, and Demi Singleton, before he talked about being called on to "love people and to protect people, and to be a river to my people."
He added, "I know, to do what we do, you got to be able to take abuse, you got to have people talk crazy about you," and apologised to the Academy and his fellow nominees, but stopped short of apologising to Chris Rock. Smith closed out his speech by adding that he hopes the Academy invites him back next year.
Here's the speech in full.