Mark Wahlberg’s “Checkered Racist Past” Has Fans Questioning Why He Presented ‘Everything, Everywhere, All at Once’ Cast With SAG Award

Indie hit Everything, Everywhere, All At Once had a big night at the Screen Actors Guild Awards on Sunday (Feb. 26), though some fans are calling out the ceremony for having Mark Wahlberg present the cast with an award, despite his violent past. 

Wahlberg — who was arrested for committing hate crimes on two separate occasions in the 1980s when he was a teenager living in Boston — presented the predominantly Asian cast of the Oscar-nominated film with the award for outstanding performance.

Fans were quick to share their thoughts online. “REALLY interesting that Will Smith wasn’t invited to present Best Actress while Mark Wahlberg is presenting the ensemble award to a film with a predominantly Asian cast when he punched and nearly blinded a Vietnamese man…,” one Twitter user wrote.

It is typically tradition for the recipient of the Oscar for Outstanding Performance by a Male Actor to present the Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor category at the next year’s ceremony. 

Another tweet suggested, “I feel like if Mark Wahlberg (or his management) wanted his checkered racist past to fade into obscurity, presenting the SAG award to EEEAAO would not have been on the list of gigs to take.”

Wahlberg’s history of racially motivated violence is no secret in the industry. At the age of 15, Wahlberg and his friends chased three Black children on their bikes, yelling racial slurs and hurling rocks at them. The very next day, he and a group of other white men harassed a group of Black children who were reportedly all around the age of nine or 10. He was found guilty of violating the civil rights of his victims and a civil rights injunction was issued against him. 

In 1988, two years later, Wahlberg attacked two Vietnamese men on two separate occasions on the same day, per The Independent. He knocked one man unconscious with a five-foot-long stick and later punched an army veteran in the eye that same day. Officers reported that he used racial slurs to describe the two victims.

He was charged with attempted murder but ultimately pled guilty for felony assault, claiming he was high at the time. Wahlberg was sentenced to two years in prison for violating the civil rights injunction that had been filed against him after his first offense, but he only went on to serve 45 days.

Wahlberg addressed his past in an interview with The Guardian in 2020, saying at the time, “Certainly I made a lot of terrible mistakes and I paid for those mistakes dearly.” The actor explained that he “did the work” to change his circumstances after completing his time in prison.

“I also prided myself on doing the right thing and turning my life around. Whether I found myself venturing off into Hollywood and a music career, or working a 9-to-5 job as a construction worker, whatever path I was going to take, I was going to do the right thing,” he continued. “So I think no, judging a person on what he’s doing and where he’s coming from and all those things, no, I would hope that people would be able to get a second chance in life.”

Wahlberg also petitioned for a criminal pardon in 2017 to get his criminal record cleared.

Everything, Everywhere, All At Once swept the SAGs on Sunday. Michelle Yeoh and Ke Huy Quan both became the first Asian performers to win their respective categories — best actress and best supporting actor — and Jamie Lee Curtis won best supporting actress over Angela Bassett in a surprising upset.

The film may have swept the categories that evening (indicating how the movie might perform at the Oscars ceremony in March) but the night ended on a bittersweet note for viewers at home.