Will Smith said that he saw his career and money “flying away” after he took ayahuasca, a hallucinogenic drink, before he slapped Chris Rock during Oscars 2022.
In an interview with David Letterman for his Netflix series My Next Guest Needs No Introduction which was taped before the Academy Awards, the King Richard actor said he hallucinated that his whole life was getting destroyed.
The actor talked about drinking ayahuasca, a drink that causes a psychedelic experience, saying, “Once you drink it you’re going to see yourself in a way you’ve never seen yourself.”
“One of the experiences was the individual most hellish psychological experience of my life,” he added. "I drank it, and it usually takes about 45 minutes for it to kick in.”
He recalled, “I was sitting there and even though I thought it wouldn't hit me, all of a sudden I saw my money flying far away, my house flying away and my career going far away."
Smith said that in that moment he tried to grab his money and his career, adding, “My whole life is getting destroyed.”
“This is my fear in real life,” he admitted. “And I’m in there and I’m wanting to vomit and all of that, and I hear a voice saying: ‘This is what the (expletive) it is. This is what the (expletive) life is.'”
He then went to describe another disturbing hallucination as he heard his daughter Willow crying for help to which he recollected replying as he shouted, “I don’t see.” Then the shaman supervising him asked him to get relaxed.
Smith told Letterman, “Then slowly I stopped caring about my money, I just wanted to get to Willow. I stopped caring about my house, I stopped caring about my career.”
“When I came out of it, I realized that anything that happens in my life, I can handle it,” he concluded. “I can handle any person I lose, I can handle anything that goes wrong in my life, I can handle anything in my marriage. I can handle anything that this life has to offer me.”