In an effort to avoid disruptions to the Oscar ceremonies on March 12, the Academy has hired the first “crisis team” in its 95-year-old history, says its CEO Bill Kramer.

Last year’s program was notorious for the “slap heard round the world” when Will Smith catapulted himself on stage to attack Chris Rock after the comedian had made a joke about Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Rock declined to press charges, but Smith was banned from attending the Oscars for ten years.

This year, Kramer told Time magazine, “we have a whole crisis team, something we’ve never had before, and many plans in place. We’ve run many scenarios. So it is our hope that we will be prepared for anything that we may not anticipate right now but that we’re planning for just in case it does happen.” Kramer added: “And obviously depending on the specifics of the crisis, and let’s hope something doesn’t happen and we never have to use these, but we already have frameworks in place that we can modify.

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With last year’s brouhaha in mind, Academy president Janet Yang told guests at the recent luncheon for 2023 nominees that its response had been “inadequate.” She added that the Academy would “act swiftly, compassionately, and decisively” if similar incidents happened at future Oscar ceremonies. In addition, Oscar host Jimmy Kimmel plans to address the issue during this year’s event, which takes place on Sunday, March 12 at the Dolby Theater in Hollywood.



For his part, Will Smith released a TikTok video on Tuesday in which he took a more humorous stance about the slapping incident; within two days the video had chocked up more than 1.8 million views. Despite being banned from the ceremonies until 2033, Smith was allowed to keep his Best Actor statuette for his role in King Richard.

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