See Huge Stars Inside Will Smith’s Private Screening Of His New Movie
Will Smith held a private screening for his upcoming film Emancipation, and celebs like Dave Chapelle, Tyler Perry, and Rihanna showed up to show their support.
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Will Smith appears to be trying to move on from the controversial incident where he slapped comedian Chris Rock at the 94th Academy Awards earlier this year. The Bad Boys star has been making the rounds to promote his latest project, the Antoine Fuqua-directed drama Emancipation, which is scheduled to premiere on Apple this winter. The Oscar-winning actor attended a screening for the upcoming film a few weeks back during the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation’s 51st annual Legislative Conference in Washington D.C., and Smith recently took to Instagram to share a photo from a private screening he held, where several well-known celebrities were in attendance.
Will Smith shared the image with his 63 million followers on the social media platform with the caption “EPIC Night!! Thanx for coming to see #Emancipation. Hope ya’ll enjoyed!!” The photo, which features various stars including Dave Chapelle, Tyler Perry, Rihanna, A$AP Rocky, and Kenya Barris, has already been liked by over 771,000 accounts. Additionally, nearly 6,000 users have commented on the post to share their excitement for Smith’s latest feature.
Numerous celebrities have come out to criticize the actor following his infamous Oscar slap that took place back in March. Even The Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences board of governors banned Will Smith from attending the Oscars or returning to any other Academy events for the next 10 years due to the incident. Fortunately, not everybody has cut ties with the actor, as all the stars featured in Smith’s latest Instagram post appear to be having a splendid time following the private screening of his forthcoming movie.
Emancipation stars Will Smith as a runaway slave named Peter, who treks through the swamps of Louisiana on a treacherous journey to escape the plantation owners that nearly killed him. Starring alongside Smith are Ben Foster, Steven Ogg, Imani Pullum, Aaron Moten, Grant Harvey, and David Denman. Training Day director Antoine Fuqua helmed the feature from a script written by Bill Collage.
Awards season is just around the corner, and Emancipation is already being considered as a major contender. The project was won by Apple in a record-breaking auction well before Will Smith smacked the daylights out of Chris Rock at the 94th Academy Awards. Although there were reports that the streamer planned to push back the film’s release until 2023, Emancipation will release this December, making it eligible for the 2023 award season.
It wasn’t too long ago that Will Smith was on the verge of being canceled after several of his upcoming projects were delayed or outright axed. Now, the actor’s pipeline is loaded with new features including the recently announced sequel Bad Boys 4, and the biographical picture The Council, which is currently in pre-production. Smith will portray real-life drug kingpin Nicky Barnes in the forthcoming film, which is being directed by Peter Landesman.
Will Smith is also serving as producer on a slew of upcoming projects including the sequels Hancock 2 and The Karate Kid 2. In addition, he’s set to executive produce a currently untitled Netflix documentary featuring his real-life wife Jada Pinkett Smith. The project will reportedly feature expert interviews and other documentary content with premium scripted docudrama about different queens.
