will smith biography in english

Will Smith transitioned from successful rapper to Hollywood A-lister, starring on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air before headlining such films as Independence Day , Men in Black , and Ali .

1968-present

Quick Facts

Music career, movies and tv shows, wife jada pinkett smith and children, who is will smith.

After Will Smith met Jeff Townes at age 16, the duo launched a highly successful rap career as DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince. Smith starred on the sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air for six seasons, before establishing himself as a Hollywood A-lister with Bad Boys (1995) and Independence Day (1996). He has since headlined such popular films as Men in Black (1997) and Hitch (2005) and earned Oscar nominations for Ali (2001) and The Pursuit of Happyness (2006). Smith also earned acclaim for Concussion (2015), before returning to action fare with Suicide Squad (2016).

FULL NAME: Willard Carroll Smith Jr. BORN: September 25, 1968 BIRTHPLACE: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania SPOUSE: Sheree Zampino (1992-1995) and Jada Pinkett Smith (1997-present; separated) CHILDREN: Trey, Jaden , and Willow ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Libra

Smith was born Willard Carroll Smith Jr. on September 25, 1968, in Philadelphia to mother Caroline, a school board employee, and father Willard C. Smith, a refrigeration company owner. His middle-class upbringing saw him attend the strict Our Lady of Lourdes Catholic School, despite his family's observation of the Baptist faith. He went on to attend Overbrook High School.

His West Philadelphia neighborhood was a melting pot of cultures where Orthodox Jews co-existed with a large Muslim population. Smith was a good student whose charming personality and quick tongue were renowned for getting him out of trouble, a trait for which he soon gained the nickname "Prince.''

Smith began rapping at age 12, emulating heroes like Grandmaster Flash but tingeing his rhymes with a comedic element that would later become his trademark. At 16 Smith met future collaborator Jeff Townes at a party. The pair became friends, and the duo DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince was born.

As teens, DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince began producing music but steered clear of the gangsta rap sound that was emerging from the West Coast by groups like N.W.A. The Fresh Prince rapped about teenage preoccupations in a clean, curse-free style that middle America found safe and entertaining. The pair's first single, "Girls Ain't Nothing But Trouble," was a hit in 1986. Their 1987 debut album, Rock the House , hit the Billboard Top 200, and made Smith a millionaire before the age of 18. The early success put any thoughts of attending college out of Smith's mind.

Early on, it was reported that Smith had turned down a scholarship to Boston's elite Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), but Smith later dispelled the rumor when he told an interviewer: "My mother, who worked for the School Board of Philadelphia, had a friend who was the admissions officer at MIT. I had pretty high SAT scores and they needed Black kids, so I probably could have gotten in. But I had no intention of going to college."

In 1988, DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince continued their success with the album He's The DJ , I'm The Rapper . Featuring the radio-friendly singles "Parents Just Don't Understand," "Brand New Funk," and "Nightmare on My Street," the album won the first-ever Grammy Award for Best Rap Performance. It was followed in 1989 by And In This Corner..., which continued the pair's rise to stardom.

The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air

Two years later, Smith began his crossover into acting. Drawing on his experiences with fledgling stardom, NBC signed Smith to headline a sitcom about a street-smart kid from Philadelphia who moves in with stuffy relatives in the posh Los Angeles neighborhood of Bel-Air. Playing on his rapper persona, and at times featuring his friend Towne, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air was a huge success that ran for six seasons.

Meanwhile, Smith and Towne continued producing music, their 1991 album Homebase producing the hits "Summertime" and "Ring My Bell." Their final album together, 1993's Code Red , was notable for "Boom! Shake the Room."

Where the Day Takes You and Six Degrees of Separation

While still making The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air , Smith began a second crossover into movies. Small roles in the drama Where The Day Takes You (1992) and the comedy Made In America (1993) were followed by a critically acclaimed lead in Six Degrees of Separation (1993). Holding his own alongside Donald Sutherland , Stockard Channing and Ian McKellen , Smith played a street-wise gay hustler who cons his way through elite circles.

Smith's first steps into superstardom came with his next film, Bad Boys (1995). The high-budget cop movie saw him team up with comic Martin Lawrence , breaking away from the Black-cop-white-cop formula that had been so successful for Beverly Hills Cop and the Lethal Weapon series. The two Black leads proved an instant success and Smith — playing the smooth lady killer to Lawrence's clown — was established as leading man material.

Independence Day

Smith next took on the epic sci-fi flick Independence Day (1996), a role that confirmed him as a major player in Hollywood and the go-to guy for summer blockbusters. He played a pilot leading the counterattack against invading alien forces, and his comedic talents effortlessly transformed into the pithy one-liners all action heroes need to be able to drop while dispatching their enemies.

Men in Black and Enemy of the State

Smith fought aliens again in his next blockbuster, the comic sci-fi action film, Men in Black (1997). Playing opposite Tommy Lee Jones , Smith chewed up the screen as the new recruit to Jones' old hand. Smith rapped the theme song, and its inclusion on his 1997 solo album, Big Willie Style, brought the multi-talented actor more success. Another blockbuster followed with the slick conspiracy thriller Enemy of the State (1998), which earned Smith an NAACP Image Award nomination for Outstanding Actor in a Motion Picture.

Wild Wild West and The Legend of Bagger Vance

The string of hits came to an end in 1999 with Wild Wild West , a sci-fi cowboy Western co-starring Kevin Kline. Despite the film's lackluster box-office performance, the track Smith cut for the film became a hit on his 1999 album, Willennium . The golf movie The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000) was his next big film, with Smith playing the caddie to Matt Damon 's out-of-sorts swinger.

Oscar Nomination for Ali

The 2001 biopic Ali , based on boxing legend Muhammad Ali , gave Smith the opportunity to regain his big-screen swagger. His turn as the charismatic boxing great saw Smith put in the performance of his life, training and disciplining himself to extraordinary lengths to do justice to the athleticism — and ego — of the titular character. The film underwhelmed at the box office despite a record-breaking opening day, but Smith's performance was strong enough to garner him his first Academy Award nomination.

Men in Black II , Bad Boys II , and I, Robot

A couple of sequels were next, with Smith reprising his roles in Men In Black II (2002) and Bad Boys II (2003). Neither was a flop, but neither matched the impressive box-office take of its predecessor. Staying with the sci-fi action theme, Smith moved on to I, Robot in 2004. The Isaac Asimov adaptation featured Smith as a futuristic cop investigating a murder by a robot and then battling a robot insurgency. The film performed well, grossing more than $144 million domestically.

Hitch and The Pursuit of Happyness

Smith's smooth-talking charmer persona was put to use in the 2005 romantic comedy Hitch, playing a dating consultant who helps luckless guys with their romantic moves. Smith also penned the theme song and included it on his 2005 album, Lost and Found . Hitch was a massive success, and it was followed in 2006 by another critical and financial hit, The Pursuit of Happyness (2006). Starring alongside his real-life son Jaden , Smith captivated audiences with the story of a single father who has to build a life from scratch. He received his second Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for his performance.

I Am Legend

In 2007, Smith starred in I Am Legend , a remake of the Charlton Heston film Omega Man , in which he battled bloodthirsty vampires. The film became a national and international hit.

Hancock , Seven Pounds , and Men in Black 3

Smith then took on the dual role of actor and producer for Hancock (2008), in which he played an alcoholic anti-superhero, and for Seven Pounds (2008), about a man who sets out to change the lives of seven people. He also helped produce two more films released that year, Lakeview Terrace and The Secret Life of Bees .

After a hiatus, Smith returned to the big screen in 2012 with Men in Black 3 , followed by a turn as a military commander in the critically panned M. Night Shyamalan sci-fi flick After Earth , which co-starred Smith's son Jaden. He then made a cameo as Lucifer in the film Winter's Tale (2014).

Focus , Concussion , and Suicide Squad

Smith's next leading role came with the 2015 heist caper Focus , co-starring Margot Robbie . Later in the year, he starred as Dr. Bennet Omalu in the sports drama Concussion , earning a Golden Globe nomination for his role as a doctor fighting to raise awareness about head trauma in NFL players.

In 2016, Smith starred in the DC Comics blockbuster hit Suicide Squad , which became his most successful film since 1996's Independence Day . The same year, he also took on a more somber role as a father who loses his young daughter in the drama Collateral Beauty . Although a follow-up endeavor, Bright (2017), was thoroughly panned by critics, audiences responded more positively to the urban fantasy crime flick.

Aladdin , Gemini Man , and Bad Boys for Life

In February 2019, Smith announced that he would not be returning for the Suicide Squad sequel. Around that time, a commercial during the Grammy Awards revealed him as a wisecracking Genie in Guy Ritchie's live-action adaptation of Disney's Aladdin , which went on to top $1 billion at the global box office. Next up was Ang Lee's Gemini Man , which had Smith pulling double duty — with help from digital technology — as a 50-year-old assassin assigned to kill a 23-year-old version of himself.

The A-lister closed out the year by voicing super agent Lance Sterling in the animated Spies in Disguise , alongside Tom Holland , before opening 2020 with a return to his successful cop-buddy franchise in Bad Boys for Life .

Smith has been married twice. His first marriage, to Sheree Zampino in 1992, lasted only three years but produced a son, Willard Smith III (b. 1992), also known as Trey. He has been married to actress Jada Pinkett Smith since 1997. The couple's son, Jaden , was born in 1998, and their daughter, Willow , was born in 2000.

Smith leans politically liberal and has made donations to the presidential campaigns of Barack Obama . Smith is a fan of chess and video games and is known to take his mother on vacation every year, usually to the Canyon Ranch spa in Tucson, Arizona.

• I want to represent the idea that you really can make what you want ... I believe I can create whatever I want to create.
• I want to do good. I want the world to be better because I was here.
• I have a great time with my life and I want to share it. I love living. I think that's infectious. It's something that you can't fake.
• Being realistic is the most commonly traveled road to mediocrity. Why would you be realistic?
• There's no easy way round it. Your talent is going to fail if you're not skilled.
• I've never really viewed myself as particularly talented. Where I excel is ridiculous, sickening work ethic. While the other guys sleeping, I'm working. While the other guy is eating, I'm working.
• The first step before anybody else in the world believes it is you have to believe it.
• There's no reason to have a plan B because it distracts from plan A.
• Don't chase people. Be yourself, do your own thing and work hard.
• I'm a student of patterns, at heart I'm a physicist.

Fact Check: We strive for accuracy and fairness. If you see something that doesn’t look right, contact us !

The Biography.com staff is a team of people-obsessed and news-hungry editors with decades of collective experience. We have worked as daily newspaper reporters, major national magazine editors, and as editors-in-chief of regional media publications. Among our ranks are book authors and award-winning journalists. Our staff also works with freelance writers, researchers, and other contributors to produce the smart, compelling profiles and articles you see on our site. To meet the team, visit our About Us page: https://www.biography.com/about/a43602329/about-us

Academy Awards

Jamie Lee Curtis

Timothée Chalamet

Cillian Murphy

Justin Timberlake

14 Hispanic Women Who Have Made History

Cillian Murphy & Sterling K. Brown Oscars Grooming

The 2024 Oscar Winners and Nominees

Billie Eilish

Christopher Nolan

Ryan Gosling

• Share full article

The Great Performers Issue

Contribute to this page

• Learn more about contributing

More from this person

• View agent, publicist, legal and company contact details on IMDbPro

More to explore

Recently viewed.

Cookie banner

We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from. To learn more or opt-out, read our Cookie Policy . Please also read our Privacy Notice and Terms of Use , which became effective December 20, 2019.

By choosing I Accept , you consent to our use of cookies and other tracking technologies.

Follow The Ringer online:

• Follow The Ringer on Twitter
• Follow The Ringer on Instagram
• Follow The Ringer on Youtube

Site search

• What to Watch
• Bill Simmons Podcast
• 24 Question Party People
• 60 Songs That Explain the ’90s
• Against All Odds
• Bachelor Party
• The Bakari Sellers Podcast
• Beyond the Arc
• The Big Picture
• Black Girl Songbook
• Book of Basketball 2.0
• Boom/Bust: HQ Trivia
• Counter Pressed
• The Dave Chang Show
• East Coast Bias
• Every Single Album: Taylor Swift
• Extra Point Taken
• Fairway Rollin’
• Fantasy Football Show
• The Fozcast
• The Full Go
• Gambling Show
• Gene and Roger
• Higher Learning
• The Hottest Take
• Jam Session
• Just Like Us
• Larry Wilmore: Black on the Air
• Last Song Standing
• The Local Angle
• Masked Man Show
• The Mismatch
• Mint Edition
• Morally Corrupt Bravo Show
• New York, New York
• Off the Pike
• One Shining Podcast
• Philly Special
• Plain English
• The Pod Has Spoken
• The Press Box
• The Prestige TV Podcast
• Recipe Club
• The Rewatchables
• Ringer Dish
• The Ringer-Verse
• The Ripple Effect
• The Rugby Pod
• The Ryen Russillo Podcast
• Sports Cards Nonsense
• Slow News Day
• Speidi’s 16th Minute
• Somebody’s Gotta Win
• Sports Card Nonsense
• This Blew Up
• Trial by Content
• Wednesday Worldwide
• What If? The Len Bias Story
• Wrighty’s House
• Wrestling Show
• Latest Episodes
• All Podcasts

Filed under:

• Pop Culture
• The Misunderstood Legacy of Will Smith’s Music Career

The man formerly known as the Fresh Prince won the first rap Grammy, but is rarely looked upon as an impactful artist these days. His evolution in hip-hop is more interesting than he’s given credit for.

Share this story

• Share this on Facebook
• Share this on Twitter
• Share All sharing options

Share All sharing options for: The Misunderstood Legacy of Will Smith’s Music Career

This Sunday, Peacock will premiere the first episode of Bel-Air , a contemporary, dramatic reimagining of the beloved ’90s sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air . To mark the occasion, The Ringer is looking back on the legacy of the original series and the influence of the star who defined it, Will Smith. This is a story all about how pop culture got flipped, turned upside down. Welcome to Fresh Prince Day .

“Will Smith” means “movie star.” It’s been a couple decades since “Will Smith” last meant “rapper,” and it’s been 10,000 years since “The Fresh Prince” signified something other than a classic sitcom in perpetual syndication. To this day we call O’Shea Jackson (who?) Ice Cube. The same goes for Ice T, Queen Latifah, and LL Cool J. What about the Fresh Prince? The first rapper to win a Grammy? What do we make of the three consecutive decades when Will Smith ranked among the biggest rappers on the planet?

His earliest songs—“Parents Just Don’t Understand,” “Girls Ain’t Nothing but Trouble,” “A Nightmare on My Street”—were cool but they were also a bit corny. DJ Jazzy Jeff was a virtuoso with priceless musical innovations, such as the transformer scratch, to his credit. But the Fresh Prince always seemed a bit disengaged from the more competitive postures and movements in contemporary hip-hop. Even the meathead LL Cool J wanted to be the best in addition to being the biggest; the Fresh Prince just wanted to be the biggest. His ambition made for a contrarian outlook. It was proudly suburban. It was explicitly swear-free. It was weirdly unburdened by “top five, dead or alive” standards. These weren’t songs for the streets. These were songs for the mall. This was bottle service for the ball pit.

It’s easy for anyone younger than Funkmaster Flex to listen to hip-hop from the 1980s and hear nothing but rough experimentation until Paid in Full , Bigger and Deffer , and Criminal Minded , each released in 1987. The genre had spent a decade learning to speak. On “Summertime,” the Fresh Prince mimics Rakim and succeeds despite the obvious discrepancies; Rakim’s voice was rich and dark while Smith’s voice, even at its lowest, was always just about to crack. He also often mimicked LL Cool J, on “Charlie Mack (The First Out the Limo),” for instance, but as a lighter, scrawnier figure. Here he is, in his early-’90s transition from the Fresh Prince to Will Smith, lifting the semi-auto flow from Das EFX. It’s not uncommon for rappers to borrow popular flows and it’s always fun to discover that a rapper once took a very different approach to the mic before they blew up: Ice Cube echoed the Beastie Boys before he cofounded N.W.A; Jay-Z rather notoriously “used to rap like the Fu-Schnickens” before he recorded with Foxy Brown and the Notorious B.I.G. Will Smith was still constantly searching and transforming a decade and several awards deep into his rap stardom. He was hip-hop’s Peter Pan.

He never grew up but of course he blew up on the strength of his ability to move kid’s meals for Burger King. For half a decade or so, Will Smith’s rap crossover appeal was a bewildering force in American life. He was at once a marginal movement, compared to Aftermath, Bad Boy, and Cash Money, and yet a tremendous commercial breakthrough for hip-hop in his own right. Will Smith split into his own parallel universe. He had Eve on Willennium , but he and Eve never really existed in the same physical dimension, you know? These songs played on the same programming blocks and these rappers shared studios, yet the idea of Smith’s Columbia Records labelmate Nas ghostwriting a bit of Big Willie Style struck so many rap fans—at the time possessing a lower tolerance for ghostwriting in hip-hop—as an urban legend.

In his solo career Will Smith cornered the market on “jiggy rap.” His biggest hits in this phase—“Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It,” “Miami,” “Will 2K,” “Wild Wild West”—exemplified the common argument against that whole style of production, popularized by Puffy and the Trackmasters: Their beats were too simplistic, too dance-oriented, and they barely even bothered to reimagine the primary samples. The Trackmasters produced “Men in Black,” the musical theme for the movie and the lead single from Big Willie Style , flipping Patrice Rushen’s post-disco classic “Forget Me Nots” with Smith’s relentlessly on-brand raps about “extraterrestrial violence.” By the mid-1990s this was a common sort of selling out—Mase rapping for The Rugrats Movie ; LL Cool J, Busta Rhymes, and Method Man role-playing the Monstars for Space Jam —but more than anyone Will Smith rehearsed the PG-13 soundtrack gesture and made it his signature. “Miami” is a banger about club life in South Florida and somehow Will Smith childproofed even that. This commitment to corniness—this transcendence, dare I say—culminates rather absurdly in “Wild Wild West,” a big, ridiculous R&B hoedown in cross-promotion for the notorious summer blockbuster flop costarring Smith and Kevin Kline.

In his music, Will Smith also developed a conspicuous dadcore sensibility. On Big Willie Style he covered “Just the Two of Us,” rapping three verses about his first son, Trey, and thus transforming the original into a different kind of love song. It’s a simple flip and a bit too sappy (“ 101 Dalmatians on your CD-ROM”) for my taste. But this is the essential ingredient in his best songs, too: his willingness to sound a bit silly in comparison to his peers. He’s always moved to extreme corniness, but with a steady hand. That was his superpower. He didn’t overthink his credibility. He didn’t doubt his capacity to send an old R&B standard back to the top of the charts. Grover Washington Jr. and Bill Withers peaked at no. 2; Will Smith sent his cover of “Just the Two of Us” to no. 1 in the rap charts.

But of course Will Smith, with his blockbuster designs on everything, hit his tipping point and then inevitably succumbed to overproduction. “Black Suits Comin’ (Nod Ya Head)” from Men In Black II ; “Switch” and “Party Starter” from Lost and Found —the beats got too chunky and the flows got too choppy for the Fresh Prince to pull off. Trackmasters fell out of fashion. Timbaland and Pharrell flooded the radio with edgier crossover rap for the rest of the 2000s. I keep finding ways and excuses to once again call Will Smith “corny” but perhaps I mean “normal.” For all his profits and costumes and accolades, Will Smith was a startlingly normal dude. He was soft and he was spectacular and he had Dru Hill, Kool Moe Dee, and Stevie Wonder looking altogether foolish in the promotional campaign for the worst movie I’ve ever seen in a theater. He made this look easy. He made this look good.

In This Stream

Welcome to fresh prince day.

• Sitcom or Not, ‘The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’ Knew How to Pull Off Drama

Next Up In Music

S12e5 - “raid” and “curls” by madvillain.

• Confederacy Month, the New Drake Diss, and Stephen A.’s Apology
• 24 Question Party People: Grace Cummings
• Is ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ Taylor Swift’s Most Controversial Album?
• ‘The Tortured Poets Department’
• The Taylor Swift ‘The Tortured Poets Department’ Exit Survey

Sign up for the The Ringer Newsletter

Thanks for signing up.

Check your inbox for a welcome email.

Oops. Something went wrong. Please enter a valid email and try again.

Brutal Losses for the Lakers and Sixers. Plus, the Annual Daniel Jeremiah and Todd McShay NFL Draft Preview!

Russillo takes a look back at the incredible Monday night NBA playoff games, and Todd McShay and Daniel Jeremiah come on to discuss the top quarterbacks, share their candidates to trade up, and play a quick game of On the Clock

History Is Repeating Itself in the Worst Way for the Lakers

L.A.’s latest fall-from-behind loss was also its most gut-wrenching. Try as they might, the Lakers just can’t keep up with Nikola Jokic and the Denver Nuggets.

What Can Caleb Williams’s Worst College Game Tell Us About His NFL Prospects?

All college quarterbacks have bad games—even future greats like Patrick Mahomes, Josh Allen, and Lamar Jackson. But what do those games signal about their NFL futures? And what does Williams’s Notre Dame tape show about his game?

Line Look Aheads, Over- and Under-Reactions, and a Trip on the Riverboat Casino

Tate and Cousin Sal get together to preview some of the upcoming NBA playoff games

Can Joel Embiid Still Save the Sixers’ Season?

Philadelphia was 27 seconds away from squaring its series with New York; now it faces a dreaded 0-2 hole. But Game 2 provided at least one reason to believe that a comeback remains possible.

Our dissection of MF DOOM and Madlib’s Madvillainy continues with the songs "Raid" and "Curls"

• International edition
• Australia edition
• Europe edition

Will Smith: now Hollywood royalty, the star’s rise has been far from painless

From Fresh Prince to King Richard, personal upsets have so far failed to derail his childhood goal to be the world’s biggest film star

There’s a seemingly offhand quality which is central to the appeal of Will Smith: an innate magnetism and loose-limbed, casual coolness. But the career path from teenage rap artist to TV actor to superstar status was anything but effortless; it was the result of a self-described “psychotic” work ethic and meticulous, perhaps even obsessive, planning.

For a while, at least, he was one of the most bankable film actors on the planet – a planet that he saved on a regular basis in summer blockbusters. But while that kind of success rate is hard to sustain, Smith has shown himself to be extremely adaptable compared to his contemporaries. From film actor/musician, he has evolved into a multimedia phenomenon. He has adopted a very marketable openness and accessibility, and embraced personal failures as teachable moments.

Having already rebranded himself as a social media superstar, he cruised through lockdown with a hugely successful streamed show in which he sprawled in sweatpants while riffing with celebrity buddies on Zoom.

Now he’s back in more traditional movie star territory, with the double-pronged assault of a candid new memoir and one of his finest and most awards-friendly performances in years, as Richard Williams, father and coach of Venus and Serena, in Reinaldo Marcus Green’s King Richard . The Hollywood Reporter described him as “outstanding”, and Vanity Fair lauded “a sterling reminder of Smith’s singular charge, seizing upon a mighty challenge with thrilling recommitment”.

The book, meanwhile, is entitled Will and is sold as “an epic tale of inner transformation and outer triumph” which digs into the life events which fine-tuned Smith’s weapons-grade charisma and steely determination.

He was born Willard Carroll Smith Jr in 1968 in Philadelphia. Nicknamed “Prince” at school for his formidable charm, he tasted success early on. As the Fresh Prince, alongside his childhood friend Jeffrey “DJ Jazzy Jeff” Townes, he had released a single before he had finished high school; they were the first hip-hop artists to win a Grammy , and he was a millionaire by the age of 18.

Smith was raised a Baptist: the PG-rated rhymes derided in some quarters of the rap community were a result of an intervention by his God-fearing granny. Rather than profanity, Smith learned to harness quick-witted humour, a skill he deftly transferred from music to acting. It was not all plain sailing. Smith’s money management skills left something to be desired, and the IRS came knocking with a substantial bill and a repossession order for most of his liquid assets.

Bruised by the experience, Smith left Philadelphia for LA and, in 1990, signed as the lead in the NBC television series The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air , having been strong-armed by Quincy Jones into an off-the-cuff audition at Jones’s house.

Thanks to the IRS, Smith’s move to Hollywood was not liberally bankrolled, but he did arrive with a plan: to be the biggest movie star in the world. To this end, he studied the then 10 most successful films of all time to identify patterns. He scrutinised Tom Cruise’s promotional techniques and sought advice from heavyweights like Arnold Schwarzenegger (“Think of yourself as a politician running for Biggest Movie Star in the World,” was Arnie’s response.)

Smith’s elevation to movie star status was so swift and decisive, it’s easy to forget that he straddled two hitherto significant barriers. First, he overcame the film industry’s resistance to the idea of a television personality making the leap to the big screen – the division between the two was considerably less permeable then than now. Second, and more significantly, was the issue of race. In a movie landscape which harboured no shortage of unconscious bias and a fair amount of outright systemic racism, Smith was the first black star to be routinely cast in roles not specifically written as black.

A case in point was the 1995 buddy cop movie Bad Boys , which had been intended for Saturday Night Live comedians Jon Lovitz and Dana Carvey. Director Michael Bay, who was vocal in his dissatisfaction with the screenplay, cast Smith and Martin Lawrence in the two central roles and encouraged them to improvise rather than to stick to the lines on the page.

Bay was also instrumental in the rebranding of Smith as a big-screen star, encouraging him to take his shirt off for one shot. Smith dismissed the idea as corny, but Bay persisted and they compromised with an open shirt. Bay later recalled “I was like… ‘Look at this! You look like a movie star!’ And he’s like: ‘Shit, I do!’”

It was a revealing moment in more ways than one for Smith, who later said: “That was where I learned how important single images are. That single image took me from a comedic television actor to a potential movie star. The scripts that I started to get offered changed dramatically.”

The ripped physique certainly didn’t hurt Smith’s prospects but there has never been a shortage of sculpted torsos in Hollywood. What set Smith apart was an inherent likability. Tommy Lee Jones, Smith’s co-star in Men in Black , said: “Will is more generous than anyone, and he spreads joy. He walks into a studio, walks on to a set, and makes certain that everybody’s happy. He can’t help himself.” That’s high praise from the famously curmudgeonly Jones, who took a visceral dislike of another co-star, Jim Carrey, because he “couldn’t sanction [Carrey’s] buffoonery”.

Smith liked to attribute his drive to getting two-timed by a girlfriend when he was 16. “In my mind, she cheated because I wasn’t good enough. I remember making the decision that I will never not be good enough again.”

It’s a typical Will Smith statement, self-deprecating but with a wink of boastfulness tagged on for good measure. But, according to his new book, the need to please comes from a darker episode. At 12, he witnessed his father assault his mother and was paralysed by fear into inaction. Smith’s urge to entertain was, he suggests, partly a response to what he perceived as his own cowardice, a distraction technique to avoid further conflict. “Comedy defuses all negativity,” he writes.

Wherever the motivation lay, it worked. Smith holds several box-office records, including that of the most consecutive $100m-plus hits at the US: eight, starting with Men in Black 2 and ending with Hancock . He has been Oscar-nominated twice, for lead actor performances in Ali and The Pursuit Of Happyness ; another nod is on the cards, and early buzz suggests that the third time might be the charm.

Perhaps more revealing than the career triumphs are his reactions to the inevitable bumps in the road. Smith, as the tone of his book suggests, is into personal growth and self-actualisation. And he has no qualms about being public about his journey. Talking to British GQ recently, director Michael Mann, who worked with him on Ali , said: “He’s got a lot of balls artistically, and as a man. He’s materially, wonderfully successful – and conscious of that – but he asks himself the most serious and profound questions that every single one of us encounters in our lives.”

Thus the critical drubbing of films like After Earth prompted candid reappraisals of his career and values; in his book, Smith further confronts the painful fallout from the film: his son Jaden, who co-starred and was targeted for particularly vitriolic criticism, considered applying for legal emancipation at the age of 15, a pointed no-confidence vote in his father’s guidance. A rocky patch in Smith’s marriage to Jada Pinkett Smith was explored in a well-meaning and only slightly cringey discussion on Pinkett Smith’s web series, Red Table Talk. And in May this year he posted a snapshot displaying a lockdown paunch, with the rueful claim that he was in the “worst shape of his life”.

It was a relatable moment, but, one suspects, a calculated one. After all, you can’t make a career of saving the planet if you don’t remind people you’re human once in a while.

• The Observer
• King Richard

Most viewed

Biography2Me

World of Inspirational Biography

WILL SMITH: BIOGRAPHY, EARLY LIFE, MOVIES ACTED, STUNNING INVENTS, and AWARDS

Last Updated on October 3, 2023 by

Will Smith was born on 25 th September, 1968 in (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America) is an American actor and musician whose personality and quick wittiness helped him segue from rap music to a successful and prosperous acting career.

Smith was given the nickname (Prince Charming) in high school, which he changed to “Fresh Prince” when he started his “musical career” to represent a more hip-hop sound. In the year 1981, he forged an association with schoolmate and DJ Jeffrey Townes . They started out as DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, and in the year 1986, they released their first single album, “Girls Ain’t Nothing But Trouble,” followed by the album Rock the House.

Forbes named Smith the most bankable celebrity on the planet. As of 2014, 17 of the 21 films in which he has played a prominent part have grossed more than One Hundred Million ($100 million) worldwide, with five of them grossing more than $500 million. His films have grossed $6.6 billion at the global box office as of 2014. For “Ali” and “The Pursuit of Happyness”, he garnered Oscar nominations for Best Actor.

Overbrook High School was Smith’s alma mater. Smith did not turn down a scholarship to attend the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), as generally claimed; he never applied to college since he “wanted to rap.” Smith claims he was accepted to MIT’s “pre-engineering [summer] program” for high school students, but he never showed up. Smith claims that “My mother, who worked for the Philadelphia School Board, had a buddy who worked at MIT as an admissions officer. I had good SAT scores and they needed black students, so I could have certainly gotten in. However, I had no intention of attending college.”

In favor of “Wild Wild West,” he turned down the part of Neo in “The Matrix” in 1999. Despite the disappointment of “Wild Wild West,” Smith has stated that he has no regrets about his decision, claiming that Keanu Reeves’ performance as Neo was superior to what Smith could have achieved, despite statements to the contrary in interviews after the film’s release “On Wild Wild West, I made a mistake. That may have been more effective.”

Will Smith extended into movie with “Where the Day Takes You”, buoyed by his small-screen success in the year 1992. In the cinematic adaptation of “John Guare’s” popular stage drama Six Degrees of Separation, he played the lead role for the first time in the year 1993. Nevertheless, the action comedy-thriller Bad Boys in the year 1995 proved to be a watershed moment in his film career. While the film received mixed reviews, it grossed more over (one hundred million)$100 million worldwide, demonstrating Smith’s star power. In 1996, he starred in Independence Day, the year’s highest-grossing film.

The science-fiction comedy “Men in Black,” for which he also sang the Grammy-winning title song, was a box office blockbuster the following year, and sequels were released in 2002 and 2012. Smith also recorded his debut solo album, “Big Willie Style”, in 1997, which featured the song “Gettin’ Jiggywit It,” and “Willennium” two years later.

Following his role as an enigmatic golf caddy in The Legend of Bagger Vance in 2000, Will Smith went on to play Muhammad Ali in the biopic Ali in 2001, for which he received an Academy Award nomination; a cop from the near future in I, Robot in 2004; and a “date doctor” helping a romantically inept man find love in Hitchcock’s in 2005.

The next year, he starred in The Pursuit of Happiness, earning him a second Oscar nod for best actor for his portrayal of a single father who overcomes difficulties. Smith featured in I Am Legend in 2007 as a scientist who may be the last human on Earth after an outbreak. Smith starred in Hancock in 2008 as a superhero striving to change his reputation, and in Seven Pounds in 2008 as a guy seeking penance after killing seven people in a vehicle accident.

Smith later starred in the “science-fiction epic After Earth” in 2013, which was based on an idea he devised, alongside his child (son)“Jaden”. In the 2015 thriller “Focus”, Will Smith played a scam artist and the doctor who found the epidemic of chronic traumatic encephalopathy among NFL players. He starred as the assassin “Deadshot” in the action “thriller Suicide Squad” and as a bereaved parent in the “drama Collateral Beauty” in 2016. He played as a cop in the Netflix action picture “Bright the following year,” which is set in a Los Angeles populated by humans and supernatural creatures. Smith was then cast in the family comedy “Aladdin” as the genie in 2019.

Will Smith later starred in the sequel to his 1995 “blockbuster picture”, “Bad Boys for Life” in 2020. Smith starred as the father of tennis legends Serena and Venus Williams in the movie “King Richard in 2021”. Will Smith won the Academy Award for Best Actor for his performance. However, an incident during the ceremony overshadowed his victory. Smith took offense when comedian Chris Rock made a joke about his wife, actress Jada Pinkett Smith he married in 1997. He stormed the stage, smacked Rock, and swore at him. Later, Smith expressed regret to “Rock”.

Smith’s recording career continued with the albums Born to Reign in 2002 and Lost and Found in 2005, however neither of them were as successful as his earlier efforts. Smith has worked as a producer on several films in the early twenty-first century, including those in which he acted, and co-created and produced the sitcom All of Us (2003–07) including his wife. He hosted the Earth documentary TV series “One Strange Rock” in 2018. Will authored with Mark Manson, Smith’s book, was published in 2021.

Related Posts

Leave a Reply Cancel reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment.

Please enter an answer in digits: three × 1 =

Friend's Email Address

Your Email Address

What You Never Knew About Will Smith

Will Smith's path to movie stardom has not been typical. As Biography noted, Smith burst on the scene as a PG-rated rapper: one-half of the duo known as DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince. That initial burst of instant fame led him to television, and he starred in the beloved sitcom "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" for six hit seasons before branching out onto the big screen. 

Since then, the rapper-turned-actor has become one of Hollywood's most bankable stars: According to Box Office Mojo , his films have raked in a combined $9.3 billion at the box office. Now, however, Smith faces an uncertain future after letting his anger get the most of him during the 2022 Oscars when he strode onstage and smacked comedian Chris Rock across the face during the live television broadcast. The slap-heard-round-the-world occurred following an unfortunate joke that Rock made about Smith's wife, Jada Pinkett Smith . Making the entire thing even more bizarre, Smith just moments later went on to win his first Oscar.

There's undoubtedly much to learn about his fascinating public figure, so keep reading to find out what you never knew about Will Smith.

The reason he was disappointed when one of his movies opened at No. 1

When a movie opens at No. 1 at the box office, it's typically cause for celebration for that film's stars. Will Smith, however, has one outright stinker on his resume that he wishes, in hindsight, didn't do as well at the box office as it ultimately did:  "Wild Wild West,"  his 1999 western based on the 1960s TV series. 

During a roundtable discussion with Newsweek — which also included fellow actors Sissy Spacek, Nicole Kidman, Tom Wilkinson, Naomi Watts, and Billy Bob Thornton — Smith described the film's success as his "biggest emotional defeat and the greatest emotional pain" he'd experienced in his acting career. "The movie wasn't good," Smith admitted. "And it hurt so bad to be the No. 1 movie — to open at $52 million — and to know the movie wasn't good ." Ultimately, Smith said h felt he "cheated my audience" by releasing and promoting a terrible movie.

It's a lesson that Smith appears to have taken to heart. Speaking onstage at the 2016 Cannes Film Festival (via  Entertainment Tonight ), Smith admitted that he "found myself promoting something because I wanted to win versus promoting something because I believed in it."

He could have played Neo in 'The Matrix'

Will Smith's negative feelings about "Wild Wild West" were only compounded by the success of the film he passed up starring in it. "I did turn down Neo in 'The Matrix,'" Smith confessed in a "Storytime" video on his YouTube channel, explaining that an unconvincing pitch meeting with the Wachowski brothers — who directed "The Matrix" — guided his decision. "I'm not proud of it," Smith admitted but did concede that eventual star Keanu Reeves "was perfect" in the role.

As Smith explained, "The Matrix" would have been a very different movie had he played Neo "because I'm Black, then Morpheus wouldn't have been Black because they were looking at Val Kilmer" for the role that ultimately went to actor Laurence Fishburne. "So, I probably would've messed 'The Matrix' up. I would've ruined it." Smith believes that "I did y'all a favor" in passing.

During a red carpet interview (via Daily Motion ), Smith admitted that if he had the chance to go back in time to one of his movies and offer himself some advice, he would return to the set of "Wild Wild West" and tell himself, "***hole, why didn't you do 'The Matrix?'"

Will Smith will 'not be out-worked'

Ask Will Smith to explain the secret of his success, and you may get a surprising answer. As Smith explained during an interview with "60 Minutes" (via YouTube ), the actor never viewed his stardom as a result of his ability since he's never considered himself to be anything more than "slightly above average" in the talent department. His secret weapon, he revealed, is not his capability as a performer, but rather his "ridiculous, sickening work ethic." 

During another  interview about his drive, Smith put it even more bluntly. "I will not be outworked — period." To make his point, Smith used the example of exercising on a treadmill alongside a competitor. "There's two things: You're getting off first, or I'm gonna die," he said. "It's really that simple." 

During a conversation with the  "Rap Radar"  podcast (via CNBC ), Smith detailed the philosophy underlying the work ethic that has taken him to the upper echelons of show business. "For the most part, I don't live in a space of 'I can't," he said. "I live in a space of 'I feel confident that if I put in my 10,000 hours I can achieve anything."

Will Smith is a master at the Rubik's Cube

Will Smith's crazy work ethic is displayed in a crucial scene in his film "The Pursuit of Happyness," in which his character solves a Rubik's Cube within two minutes (via YouTube ).

There are no cutaways or camera trickery involved; Smith solved the Rubik's Cube by himself. But, of course, Smith didn't just pick the thing up and figure it out for himself but was taught by expert Tyson Mao, who holds the world's record for solving the puzzle in the shortest amount of time while blindfolded. As Mao told the Chicago Tribune , the original idea was to use a hand double for the scene, but Smith was insistent that he could do it "genuinely on-camera."

According to Mao, Smith was such a good student that he gained the ability to solve a Rubik's Cube "from any configuration." "You can scramble it for as long as you want, and it won't make it any harder for him," he added.  

Smith proved he hadn't lost that skill when he was handed a Rubik's Cube during a talk show appearance — and solved it on camera. 

He signed on to 'The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air' to pay the IRS

Will Smith was a burgeoning rapper when he was cast to star in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air," and it's not hyperbole to say the sitcom's success launched his successful Hollywood career. However, that wasn't necessarily his plan. According to "Will Smith: A Biography,"  Smith was in a deep financial hole at the time, owing to the IRS nearly $3 million due to not paying taxes on his earnings as a rapper. "Before I was in trouble with Uncle Phil, I was in trouble with Uncle Sam," Smith joked in his "Storytime" video (via YouTube ).

The IRS responded by confiscating all Smith's assets. "Being famous and broke is a *****y combination," quipped Smith, "because you're still famous and people recognize you, but they recognize you while you're sitting next to them on the bus."

When the opportunity arose for him to star in his own TV sitcom, Smith jumped at the chance to pay off his tax debt. But, as "Will Smith: A Biography" pointed out, the IRS took 70% of each of his "Fresh Prince" paychecks for the series' first three years.

He once considered killing his father

In 2021, Will Smith opened up about his life in his memoir, "Will."  An excerpt published in People detailed his fraught childhood due to his physically abusive father, William Carroll Smith Sr. As Smith wrote, his relationship with his alcoholic father was complex and not easily categorized. "My father was violent, but he was also at every game, play, and recital," Smith explained, conceding that the same "intense perfectionism" that "put food on the table" also "terrorized his family."

A defining moment occurred when Smith was nine when he witnessed his father strike his mother in the head "so hard that she collapsed. I saw her spit blood." He wrote that memory has never left him, leading to childhood fantasies that he "would one day avenge my mother." 

Smith was confronted with an opportunity for vengeance years later when his father was ill with cancer. Wheeling his terminally ill father to the bathroom, Smith recalled pausing at the top of a staircase. "I could shove him down, and easily get away with it," he wrote, describing "the decades of pain, anger, and resentment" that bubbled to the surface before he brushed those feelings aside. Smith's father died in 2016.

He met his future wife during a failed audition

Will Smith and his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith were married on New Year's Eve 1997 (via Brides ). Interestingly, the future spouses met in 1994 when she auditioned for a role on his sitcom, "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air." However, she didn't get the part revealing to  "Extra"  that producers told her she was too short to play the title character's girlfriend. It wasn't until years later that they began dating. However, there was a significant complication: He was already married to his first wife, Sheree Zampino (who later went on to join the cast of "The Real Housewives of Beverly Hills" ).

During an appearance on his wife's Facebook Watch series "Red Table Talk,"  Smith recalled being out to dinner with his then-wife and becoming overwhelmed with the "realization that I wasn't with the person I was supposed to be with." Smith and Zampino divorced in 1995 (via YouTube ).

Meanwhile, the role in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air" that Pinkett Smith had auditioned for ultimately went to actress Nia Long. "The joke that I have with Jada is that I got the job, but she got the husband," Long told People . "That's like our running joke."

His first Grammy win was both historic and controversial

In 1989, Will Smith and musical partner Jeffrey Allen Townes — or DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince — won a  Grammy for their single "Parents Just Don't Understand." Their win was a historical one, given that it was in the Best Rap Performance category — marking the first time that particular category had been introduced. 

However, Smith and Townes weren't on hand to accept their award because they decided to boycott the ceremony. The Hollywood Reporter reported that the pair balked when they discovered that the new category wouldn't be part of the televised award ceremony. "We chose to boycott," Smith told  Entertainment Tonight . "We feel that it's a slap in the face." 

As Smith explained, the Recording Academy — which puts on the annual award show — knew nothing about rap and wasn't giving the genre the respect he felt it deserved. "Our boycott was to open their eyes to rap music, so next year, some rapper will be able to perform at the Grammys, and the awards will be televised because the music is large enough and important enough to be on the show," he said.

He apologized to a former co-star after a feud that lasted decades

When actor Janet Hubert was replaced in the role of Aunt Viv on "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air," it led to a very public feud between Hubert and Will Smith that lasted decades. "I can say straight up that Janet Hubert wanted the show to be 'The Aunt Viv of Bel-Air Show,'" Smith sniped in a 1993 radio interview (via TV Line ). "She said once, 'I've been in the business for 10 years, and this snotty-nosed punk comes along and gets a show.' To her, I'm the Antichrist." 

That same year, Hubert told the  Los Angeles Times she was "hurt and disappointed" to part ways with the show. Her apparent bitterness was still on display when she told TMZ  in 2011 that a reunion was unthinkable because she would never again "do anything with an ***hole like Will Smith."

Ultimately, she agreed to be part of the 2020 reunion special (via HBO Max ), in which the former co-stars explained their behavior and then apologized for it. "We've said such hateful things about each other, probably. And I'm sorry," said Hubert, as reported by Vanity Fair , with Smith responding by telling her, "I'm sorry."

The reason he spent years thinking of himself as a coward

As Will Smith wrote in his 2021 memoir "Will" (via People ), watching, at age nine, his father assault his mother was a moment he could never put behind him. He had never been able to overcome the guilt he felt "for my inaction that day" for his inability to stand up to his father. 

Ironically, his feelings of cowardice have also driven him to achieve ever-greater heights in his career. "What you have come to understand as 'Will Smith,' the alien-annihilating M.C., the bigger-than-life movie star, is largely a construction — a carefully crafted and honed character — designed to protect myself," he wrote, as excerpted by GQ . 

It was his father's death, he told the magazine, that finally allowed him to share the secret he'd been keeping for his entire life. "I never would've been able to talk about that while he was alive," Smith admitted.

He achieved his goal of becoming the world's biggest movie star

Having successfully transitioned from rapper to actor via "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air," when the series ended its six-season run in 1996, Smith set a somewhat audacious goal for himself: to become the biggest movie star in the world. "I wanted to do what Eddie Murphy was doing. I wanted to make people feel how I felt the first time I saw 'Star Wars,'" Smith wrote in his memoir, "Will" (via GQ ).

As The Hollywood Reporter pointed out, Smith achieved that goal by becoming the only actor in Hollywood history to boast 10 consecutive films that earned more than $150 million at the international box office.

Of course, that success didn't just happen accidentally. "When I moved into acting, that was the first time I started applying skill to my talents," he told the "Rap Radar" podcast (via  CNBC ). "You're born with talent, and there are certain things that you just do naturally ... But skill is acquired through discipline."

The history leading to Will Smith slapping Chris Rock

Will Smith made headlines and Oscar history when he strode onstage during the 2022 Academy Awards and slapped presenter Chris Rock in the face (via YouTube ) after the comedian had jokingly compared Jada Pinkett Smith's bald look to Demi Moore's shaved head in "G.I. Jane." For her part, Pinkett Smith had previously opened up about her struggles with alopecia  (via Page Six ).

However, there may have been more history behind Smith's action — which led him to be banned from the Oscars for 10 years, Variety has reported — than viewers realized. When Rock hosted the 2016 Oscars, he made a joke at the expense of Pinkett Smith, who was publicly boycotting the event due to that year's #OscarsSoWhite controversy (via the BBC ). "Jada boycotting the Oscars is like me boycotting Rihanna's panties," Rock quipped at the time (via YouTube ). "I wasn't invited."

When asked about Rock's mockery, reported Entertainment Tonight , Pinkett Smith seemingly brushed it off. "It comes with the territory," she said.

He had an ayahuasca-fueled vision of his career imploding

Whatever the ultimate impact of that slap on Will Smith's career, he shared a somewhat eerie revelation during an interview taped before the Oscars. Appearing on David Letterman's Netflix interview series, "My Next Guest Needs No Introduction," Smith revealed he'd been on a quest for spiritual enlightenment that included 14 experiences taking ayahuasca in Peru over two years. According to Smith, as reported by Entertainment Weekly , his "journeys" via the hallucinogenic substance represented "the individual most hellish psychological experience" he'd ever faced.

As Smith explained, one of those visions involved his career evaporating before his eyes. "I started seeing all of my money flying away, and my house is flying away, and my career is going away, and I'm trying to grab for my money, and my career and my whole life is getting destroyed," he recounted. 

Bad trip or a legitimate premonition? That's open to interpretation.