While Will Smith holds on to figure out what action the Academy will do in response to his slapping of Chris Rock for joking about Jada Pinkett Smith’s hair, others wonder what effect it will have on the new Oscar winner’s career. One of his past co-stars has stated that he will never work with him in the future.
Comedian Paul Rodriguez claims he witnessed Smith’s rage firsthand while working on the set of the 2001 film “Ali.” Smith bulked himself by 35 pounds to play the boxing legend. His astonishing metamorphosis into Muhammad Ali won him his first Academy Award nomination.
Rodriquez added that when Will Smith turned around (after the smack) he had that smug grin on his face. Rodriquez have seen that expression before. He feels like he is smacked with verbal abuse every day.
Rodriguez claims that while filming, Smith transformed into a real-life “Jekyll and Hyde.”
Rodriguez explained that Will Smith would be going about, and he’d hurl some abuse at him.
Rodriguez was cast as Dr. Ferdie Pacheco, Muhammed Ali’s boxing ring medic, a part he travelled all the way to Africa to play for the rumble in the jungle sequences.
Rodriguez claims that when the real-life doctor arrived on set, things became heated. The doctor apparently complained that his character didn’t get enough screen time. According to Rodriguez, the doctor used racist insults at Will Smith. Rodriguez alleges Smith then took out his rage on him.
Rodriguez even wrote a journal about the painful event.
“The comments simply keep coming, with that look of impunity.” And I’m thinking to myself, ‘It went from one of the happiest times in my life to a dreadful circumstance,'” Rodriguez explained.
Rodriguez’s planned part was removed, and he was downgraded to the status of extra.
“I had some lines. I didn’t try out for the role of extra here. Rodriguez described the experience as “humiliating.”
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