Why Zöe Kravitz regrets reacting to Will Smith’s Oscars slap: ‘It’s a scary time to have an opinion’

Zoë Kravitz is opening up about her reaction to the controversial Oscars slap, involving Will Smith and Chris Rock. The Hollywood star is now revealing that she regrets ever sharing her thoughts about the incident.

Following the altercation that took place during the ceremony, the actress shared a photo from the red carpet on social media. “Here’s a picture of my dress at the show where we are apparently assaulting people on stage now,” she wrote.

And to confirm her thoughts on the incident at the time, Zöe responded “nope” to a comment on the post that asked if she was defending Will for standing up for his wife Jada Pinkett Smith, following the alopecia joke directed at her.

© Instagram

The ‘Batman’ star went on to delete the post, as she now has a different perspective. “I’m torn about what to say right now, because I’m supposed to just talk about it; I have very complicated feelings around it,” Zöe said during an interview with WSJ Magazine.

She continued “I wish I had handled that differently. And that’s OK,” explaining that she was “reminded” that she is an artist, and “being an artist is not about everybody loving you or everyone thinking you’re hot. It’s about expressing something that will hopefully spark a conversation or inspire people or make them feel seen.”

“I think I’m in a place right now where I don’t want to express myself through a caption or a tweet. I want to express myself through art,” the actress said, declaring that “It’s a scary time to have an opinion or to say the wrong thing or to make controversial art or statements or thoughts or anything.”

© GettyImages

But Zöe was not only criticized about her reaction to the Oscars slap, as she started trending on social media for some previous comments she had said about Jaden Smith when he was still 14.

“There were moments that I was hanging out with Jaden and thinking, I can’t believe you’re 14, I have to check myself, like what I say to you,” she said in 2013. “He’s so handsome, I was always like, When you’re older, you know, we’ll hang out… Nope, that’s inappropriate, you’re 14.”