Video of Chris Rock Looking Stunned After Oscars Slap Sparks Sympathy

A video of comedian Chris Rock's reaction after actor Will Smith slapped him at the Oscars has gone viral on TikTok.

Smith stepped on stage and smacked Rock after the comedian made a joke about his wife's (Jada Pinket Smith) appearance and compared her to the G.I Jane character from the 1997 film.

The short 25-second clip of Rock's behavior afterwards was posted on Tuesday and has been viewed over 9.6 million times and has over 880,000 likes and over 42,000 comments on TikTok.

The video was posted by TikTok user Sincerelyordinary and the video was captioned: "Imagine you are slapped and there is violence in front of 50 million people."

The footage overlay also has the words "Look at Chris' face" with a crying emoji.

The brief clip showed Rock handing winners their Oscar awards to hold with the comedian looking seemingly uncomfortable.

He appears to catch the eye of someone off-camera and pulls a face of surprise while shrugging his shoulders.

Many of the comments on the video were sympathetic to the comedian and praised him for his ability to continue to do his job during the ceremony.

Following the incident, comedians also took to social media to defend Rock and condemn Smith.

"Let me tell you something, it's a very bad practice to walk up on stage and physically assault a Comedian," comedian Kathy Griffin tweeted.

"Now we all have to worry about who wants to be the next Will Smith in comedy clubs and theatres."

Other comedians have admitted their own fears that Smith has started a precedent for violence against entertainers.

"Somebody in Will Smith's circle needs to tell him that there is no way what he did tonight won't result in a comedian somewhere getting beat up or killed," Comedian Hal Sparks wrote on social media.

"He has greenlit a lot of violence. There's gonna need to be a lot of clean-up."

"So upsetting, on every level, bravo to Chris Rock for not eviscerating Will Smith, which he could do any day of the week," Comedian Rosie O'Donnell tweeted.

"He walked away, bravo sad display of toxic masculinity from a narcissistic madman."

Despite the significant criticism Will Smith has received online following the incident, a new poll has indicated that most Americans think Chris Rock was in the wrong.

The poll was conducted by Blue Rose Research and found that overall 52.3 percent believe Chris Rock was more wrong, while 47.7 percent of people believe Will Smith was more wrong.

The poll was shared on Twitter by the head of Blue Rose Research, David Shor. It was conducted on Monday and asked 2,162 online respondents for their take on the moment.

The poll also broke itself down into other categories, including age, income, education and race.