Monday, April 21, 2025

The Alec Baldwin Joke Oscars Co-Host Amy Schumer Wasn’t Allowed To Tell

Unlike the Golden Globes, where hosts like Ricky Gervais are given free rein, there are some jokes that Oscars hosts are not allowed to make.

[imagesource: AFP]

The 2022 Academy Awards will be remembered for one thing and one thing only.

The Slap.

What a pity, because there were so many movies and actors that deserved to be celebrated but have become mere footnotes.

A shoutout to Troy Kotsur for making Oscars history as the first deaf man to take home a win, nabbing Best Supporting Actor for his role as Frank Rossi, a deaf father and fisherman in CODA.

Watch that movie because it’s superb.

The Oscars were co-hosted by comedians Regina Hall, Amy Schumer, and Wanda Sykes. Unlike the Golden Globes, where hosts like Ricky Gervais are given free rein, there are some jokes that the hosts are not allowed to make.

During her first stand-up appearance since the Oscars, at Las Vegas’s Mirage Theatre on Saturday, Schumer spelt out what didn’t make the cut.

This via Deadline:

Schumer then launched into a series of jokes that, she said by way of comic set-up, she had been forbidden by lawyers to tell during the Oscar broadcast.

The jokes, some making reference to Joe Rogan and James Franco, included one about the Rust set shooting. “Don’t Look Up is the name of a movie? More like don’t look down the barrel of Alec Baldwin’s shotgun,” she said.

“I wasn’t allowed to say any of that, but you can just come up and [slap] someone,” she quipped.

That’s a reference to the shooting on the set of Rust, which took the life of Halyna Hutchins.

Probably a good thing she didn’t tell that one because it surely would have tanked.

Schumer also made it clear that she is not a fan of Will Smith’s behaviour, calling him ‘Ali’ during her routine in reference to him starring in the 2001 Muhammad Ali biopic, Ali:

Schumer said, “I was kind of feeling myself…and then all of a sudden, Ali was making his way up. And it was just a f*cking bummer. All I can say is that it was really sad, and I think it says so much about toxic masculinity. It was really upsetting…”

On the night, she actually handled The Slap really well:

We also need to acknowledge what I reckon was the joke of the evening, aimed at Leonardo DiCaprio:

[source:deadline]