will smith biography.com

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.

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The Fresh Prince of Belles-Lettres? Will Smith Has a Memoir.

By Alexandra Jacobs

• Published Nov. 9, 2021 Updated Nov. 30, 2021
• Share full article

Fourth of July weekend, 1996. America has gasped en masse watching aliens detonate the White House in the movie “Independence Day” and, at 3 a.m. in Los Angeles, the telephone of its young star, Will Smith, jangles him awake.

It’s his domineering father, calling from Philadelphia to crow about the boffo box office receipts. “Remember I told you ! There’s no such thing as luck,” this man he calls Daddio reminds him several times.

Smith is baffled. Then Daddio, piling on affectionate profanity, concedes he was wrong about being the creator of your own destiny, about success being the result of preparation meeting opportunity and all that. His son, a rapper-turned-sitcom actor and now overnight matinee idol, is just the luckiest man he has ever met.

Titled simply “Will,” with all of that word’s felicitous double entendres of iron and resolve, Smith’s autobiography is indeed a fairy tale of dazzling good fortune — albeit one told by a narrator who admits by the second chapter that he is unreliable, a lifelong embellisher for whom “the border between fantasy and reality has always been thin and transparent.”

The book is also intermittently a call to self-actualization: Written with Mark Manson, a mega-selling personal-growth author himself prone to profanity, it’s sprinkled with homilies like “Living is the journey from not knowing to knowing. From not understanding to understanding. From confusion to clarity.” A Fresh Prince of all media, Smith has so many “angels” to thank along this “journey,” he directs readers to his Instagram account rather than kill more trees with lengthy acknowledgments.

It’s more like a wild ride than a journey, however, one whose most valuable insights are to be gleaned not on Instagram but in a pre-web world of suburban basements, cassette decks, network TV shows, fax machines, party lines and playing outside.

During Smith’s childhood in the Wynnefield neighborhood of West Philadelphia, Daddio was a hard-drinking self-employed refrigeration engineer of militaristic discipline but erratic temper. He once struck Smith’s mother, known as Mom-Mom — an office and then school administrator of her own considerable mettle — so hard she spit blood. Witnessing this at age 9, Will determined heartbreakingly that he was a “coward” for not intervening — a self-characterization that echoes throughout this story and, he theorizes later, drove him to compensate by powering through fear. (For his 50th birthday, he bungee-jumped backward out of a helicopter above the Grand Canyon .)

Smith developed a work ethic bagging ice and laying bricks for the family business, but he felt safest when Daddio, a frustrated photography buff, was making home movies. The camera had no sound and so the little boy learned to ham it up, forever bursting into frame. “I invented photobombing,” he writes.

Years later, when his old man is confined to a wheelchair with heart disease, Smith confesses he contemplated pushing him down a staircase, like Richard Widmark’s character in the film noir “Kiss of Death”: “My 911 call would be Academy Award level.” It’s a rare flash of darkness from a guy whose psychological adaptations were affability and popularity, the desire to make sure everyone around him was having a good time.

In the rap world where he made his name, those traits weren’t always appreciated, and Smith’s reputation for being “soft” and “bubble gum” still rankles. He encountered his share of violence outside as well as inside the home, solidly middle-class though it was. In one early meeting with an annoyed television executive, he and his entourage were so sure a brawl was about to break out that his manager lifted a five-pound snow globe in anticipatory self-defense.

He tells of learning to appeal to white sensibilities at the Catholic school he attended, until his parents withdrew him after a racist incident at the football awards banquet; and of getting into what Mom-Mom calls “hippity-hopping” at Overbrook High, which was predominantly Black. Smith’s collaboration with Jeffrey Allen Townes, a.k.a. DJ Jazzy Jeff, a nerdy kid from another neighborhood who survived non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, was so successful, with a hit song before graduation, that Smith decided against college. “We were seeking our sound,” he writes of their intense early partnership, “but we found ourselves.”

Scenes from tours with Public Enemy and 2 Live Crew are amazing 3-D postcards from the rosy dawn of the genre, including friction with local law enforcement in the South, onstage fellatio and the nightly “hanging” of a stuntman in a Ku Klux Klan hood. Smith squandered his earnings and neglected to pay taxes, only to get a lucky second break from Quincy Jones, his Obi Wan Kenobi, to star with Townes on a custom-built sitcom, “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.”

Though Smith claims he didn’t read a book cover to cover until he was “well into” his 20s, he has the literary aplomb (thanks partly to Mom-Mom) and the trust in his manager’s discernment to turn down $10 million for an early project called “8 Heads in a Duffel Bag,” choosing instead Paul Poitier in John Guare’s “Six Degrees of Separation” for $300,000. Eventually he gorges on magical realism and mythology, falling in love with Paulo Coelho’s “The Alchemist” and Joseph Campbell’s “The Hero With a Thousand Faces.”

Smith’s own hero’s quest, at first, is for more money (“sucking all the cash out of the weekend”), more fame, more global records, a house as palatial as the one he saw growing up on “Dallas” — no matter that his second wife, the formidable Jada Pinkett, doesn’t want to arrive at breakfast on a stallion the way Sue Ellen Ewing did.

As the book progresses, and Smith’s celebrity becomes more stratospheric and snow globe-like, the air grows thinner; he starts to gasp for breath and turns inward. “Am I an addict?” he wonders during a period of introspection that includes meditation, a trip to Trinidad, the therapeutic identification of a persona called Uncle Fluffy and over a dozen ayahuasca ceremonies. He’s not hooked on drugs, or drink, or “sex like some ghetto hyena.” Smith is a workaholic, and a win-aholic, those most virtuous and therefore invisible of vices.

Writing a book that will probably blow up the charts, and publicizing it, may not be good for his recovery. But one day at a time.

Alexandra Jacobs is a book critic for The Times and the author of “Still Here: The Madcap, Nervy, Singular Life of Elaine Stritch.” Follow her on Twitter: @AlexandraJacobs .

Will By Will Smith with Mark Manson Illustrated. 418 pages. Penguin Press. $30.

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Will Smith Biography

actor; musician Born: 9/25/1968 Birthplace: Philadelphia

Smith got his start in show business as half of the Grammy Award-winning rap duo DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince. An auspicious acting debut in television's Fresh Prince of Bel-Air (1990–96) led to an equally successful movie career, including leading roles in the blockbusters Independence Day (1996), Men in Black (1997) and Men in Black II (2002), Enemy of the State (1998), Wild Wild West (1999), The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000), Ali (2001), and Hitch (2005). He got critical acclaim for his role in 2006's The Pursuit of Happyness in which his young son costarred. He released his first solo album Big Willie Style in 1997. He is married to actress Jada Pinkett-Smith .

Here are the facts and trivia that people are buzzing about.

MIT Black History

Will smith, 1986.

Will Smith in science class at Overbrook High School in Philadelphia, PA, 1986.

Willard “Will” Carroll Smith, Jr.  is an American actor, producer, rapper and songwriter. He graduated with the class of 1986 from Overbrook High School in Philadelphia, PA. Smith's break-out role in the late-1980s hit television show  The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air  led to a successful career in Hollywood. 

Smith was born in West Philadelphia, the son of Caroline (Bright), a Philadelphia school board administrator, and Willard Carroll Smith, Sr., a refrigeration engineer...Though widely reported, it is untrue that Smith turned down a scholarship to attend [MIT]; he never applied to college because he "wanted to rap." Smith says he was admitted to a "pre-engineering [summer] program" at MIT for high school students, but he did not attend. According to Smith, "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." IMDb  [Internet Movie Database]

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Get Powerful Life Lessons Directly From One of the Most Successful Stars on the Planet

A number of years ago, Will Smith and his team contacted me telling me that he wanted help to write a book about his life. He wanted to not only share his stories but also impart some of his life’s lessons, recounting how he overcame struggles and setbacks, survived abuse, trauma and racism, and came out the other end one of the biggest icons on the planet. Helping him write this book has been one of the honors of my career and the result is nothing short of profound.

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When Will Smith was eleven years old, his father decided he needed a new wall on the front of his shop. The laying of this wall, brick by brick, would come to define a large part of Will’s life. Learn how in this free chapter from the bestselling memoir.

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What People Are Saying

Praise for ‘will’.

Many people can live a really fantastic life. Many people can write a great book. There are few people I think who can translate a fantastic life into a fantastic book…. It’s raw… one of the most anticipated yet unexpected memoirs that has ever come out.

It shows every high, every low, and the sheer will it took you to become who you are… I love the book. It’s fantastic.

This book doesn’t waste any time… Like a lot of families, mine included, we talk about nothing. You took the carpet, you shook it, you beat it with a broom, you let it all out. … The book is so good.

Will is not just a gift for the reader but an absolutely entertaining treat as well… It’s filled with laugh out loud, nostalgic references alongside poignant, powerful, relatable life and career lessons. … While we often think of leaders as successful, powerful… and oftentimes rich, Smith reminds us that the best leaders are really vulnerable, relatable and teachable.

Will Smith isn’t holding back in his bravely inspiring new memoir… An ultimately heartwarming read, Will provides a humane glimpse of the man behind the actor, producer and musician, as he bares all his insecurities and trauma.

The real Smith, the one that yells, cries, experiences heartbreak, is much more interesting. Early on, his act gives way to images of unhealthy relationship patterns marked by people pleasing and insecurity. Elsewhere, Will rewards music fans with memories of hip-hop’s early days, when getting a song played on the radio was a crowning achievement and selling rap albums was almost inconceivable.

About the Book

One of the most dynamic and globally recognized entertainment forces of our time opens up fully about his life, in a brave and inspiring book that traces his learning curve to a place where outer success, inner happiness, and human connection are aligned.

Along the way, Will tells the story in full of one of the most amazing rides through the worlds of music and film that anyone has ever had. Will Smith’s transformation from a fearful child in a tense West Philadelphia home to one of the biggest pop stars of his era and then one of the biggest movie stars in Hollywood history, with a string of box office successes that will likely never be broken, is an epic tale of inner transformation and outer triumph, and Will tells it astonishingly well. But it’s only half the story.

Will Smith thought, with good reason, that he had won at life: not only was his own success unparalleled, his whole family was at the pinnacle of the entertainment world. Only they didn’t see it that way: they felt more like star performers in his circus, a seven-days-a-week job they hadn’t signed up for. It turned out Will Smith’s education wasn’t nearly over.

This memoir is the product of a profound journey of self-knowledge, a reckoning with all that your will can get you and all that it can leave behind. Written with the help of Mark Manson, author of the multi-million-copy bestseller The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck , Will is the story of how one exceptional man mastered his own emotions, written in a way that can help everyone else do the same.

Few of us will know the pressure of performing on the world’s biggest stages for the highest of stakes, but we can all understand that the fuel that works for one stage of our journey might have to be changed if we want to make it all the way home. The combination of genuine wisdom of universal value and a life story that is preposterously entertaining, even astonishing, puts Will the book, like its author, in a category by itself.

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Download a free chapter of Will, Will Smith’s #1 bestselling memoir

• Born June 8 , 1971 · Winchester, Hampshire, England, UK
• Will Smith was born in 1971. He was brought up in Jersey in the Channel Islands. Beginning as a stand-up comedian he won Time Out's Comedy award for 2004 and Chortle's Best headliner for 2005. For several seasons he has also been a popular regular at the Edinburgh Fringe and in 2007 supported Ricky Gervais on his Fame tour. As a writer he has contributed to the satirical political sitcom 'The Thick of It', in which he also acts and the American TV satire 'Veep'. - IMDb Mini Biography By: don @ minifie-1
• Relatives Olly Smith (Sibling)
• His teenage devotion to the prog-rock band Marillion in the 1980s inspired his 2005 tour "Misplaced Childhood" (named after their 1985 number-one album).
• He is the brother of broadcaster and wine expert Olly Smith .
• He presented Marillion with the "UK Band of the Year" award at the 2017 Progressive Music Awards in London.
• His favourite albums are "Clutching at Straws" by Marillion , "Into The Great Wide Open" by Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, "Lucky Town" by Bruce Springsteen , "The Unforgettable Fire" by U2 and "Bringing It All Back Home" by Bob Dylan .

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Will Hardcover – November 9, 2021

Purchase options and add-ons

• Print length 432 pages
• Language English
• Publisher Penguin Press
• Publication date November 9, 2021
• Dimensions 6.37 x 1.34 x 9.53 inches
• ISBN-10 1984877925
• ISBN-13 978-1984877925
• See all details

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Editorial Reviews

About the author, excerpt. © reprinted by permission. all rights reserved..

I've always thought of myself as a coward. Most of my memories of my childhood involve me being afraid in some way-afraid of other kids, afraid of being hurt or embarrassed, afraid of being seen as weak.

But mostly, I was afraid of my father.

When I was nine years old, I watched my father punch my mother in the side of her head so hard that she collapsed. I saw her spit blood. That moment in that bedroom, probably more than any other moment in my life, has defined who I am today.

Within everything that I have done since then--the awards and accolades, the spotlights and the attention, the characters and the laughs--there has been a subtle string of apologies to my mother for my inaction that day. For failing her in that moment. For failing to stand up to my father.

For being a coward.

What you have come to understand as "Will Smith," the alien-annihilating MC, the bigger-than-life movie star, is largely a construction--a carefully crafted and honed character--designed to protect myself. To hide myself from the world. To hide the coward.

My father was my hero.

His name was Willard Carroll Smith, but we all called him "Daddio."

Daddio was born and raised in the rough and rugged streets of North Philadelphia in the 1940s. Daddio's father, my grandfather, owned a small fish market. He had to work from 4:00 a.m. until late at night every day. My grandmother was a nurse and often worked the night shift at the hospital. As a result, Daddio spent much of his childhood alone and unsupervised. The North Philly streets had a way of hardening you. You either crystallized into a mean motherfucker, or the hood broke you. Daddio was smoking cigarettes by eleven and drinking by the age of fourteen. My father developed a defiant and aggressive attitude that would continue all his life.

When he was fourteen, my grandparents, fearing where his life was headed, scraped together what money they could and sent him to an agricultural boarding school in the Pennsylvania countryside where kids learned farming techniques and basic handyman work. It was a strict and traditional place, and by sending him there they hoped to introduce some much-needed structure and discipline into his life.

But nobody was going to tell my father what to do. Other than working on some of the tractor engines, he couldn't be bothered with what he described as "that hillbilly bullshit." He would skip classes; he smoked cigarettes and kept on drinking.

At age sixteen, Daddio was done with this school and ready to go home. He decided to get himself kicked out. He started disrupting classes, ignoring all the rules, and antagonizing anyone in a position of authority. But when the administrators tried to send him home, my grandparents refused to take him back. "We paid for the full year," they said. "You're getting paid to deal with him, so deal with him." Daddio was stuck.

But Daddio was a hustler--he was going to find his way out: On his seventeenth birthday, he snuck off campus, walked half a dozen miles to the nearest recruiting office, and enlisted in the United States Air Force. This was classic Daddio--he was so hell-bent on defying authority and rebelling against both his parents and the school that he jumped out of the frying pan of an agricultural boarding school and directly into the fire of the United States military. He ended up in the exact structure and discipline my grandparents had desperately hoped to instill in him.

But as it turned out, Daddio loved it. It was in the military that he discovered the transformative power of order and discipline, two values that he came to worship as the guardrails protecting him from the worst parts of himself. Wake up at 4:00 a.m., train all morning, work all day, study all night--he found his lane. He discovered that he could outlast anybody, and he began to take pride in that. It was another aspect of his defiant attitude. Nobody could force him to wake up with a bugle horn because he already was up.

With his passionate work ethic, boundless energy, and undeniable intelligence, he should have quickly risen through the ranks. But there were two issues.

First, he had a brutal temper, and superior officer or not, if you were wrong, he wasn't doing it. Second, his drinking. Let me tell you, my father was one of the smartest people I've ever known, but when he was angry, or drunk, he became an idiot. He would break his own rules, subvert his own objectives, destroy his own things.

After about two years in the military, this self-destructive streak peeked through the veil of order and ended his service career.

One night, he and the guys from his platoon were gambling. (Daddio was sweet with a pair of dice.) He took those dudes for almost a thousand dollars. Once he'd stashed the winnings in his footlocker, he headed out to get something to eat, but when he returned from the mess hall, the guys had stolen back the money. In his fury, Daddio drank himself into a frenzy, took out his service pistol, and lit up the barracks. Nobody got hurt, but it was enough for the air force to show him the door. He was fortunate that he wasn't court-martialed--instead, they just discharged him, put him on a bus, and invited him to never come back.

This was a tension that ripped through my father's entire life--he demanded such rigid perfection from himself and the people around him, yet after too many drinks, or if he snapped, he would burn everything to the ground.

Daddio moved back to Philly. Undaunted, he took a job in a steel mill while putting himself through night school. He studied engineering and showed a real aptitude for both electricity and the science of refrigeration. One day, after being passed over for a promotion at the steel mill for the third or fourth time because of his race, he simply walked out the door and never went back. He knew refrigeration, so he decided heÕd start his own business.

Daddio was brilliant. Like many sons, I worshipped my father, but he also terrified me. He was one of the greatest blessings of my life, and also one of my greatest sources of pain.

My mom was born Carolyn Elaine Bright. She's a Pittsburgh girl, born and raised in Homewood, a predominantly Black neighborhood on the east side of the city.

My mother, a.k.a. "Mom-Mom," is eloquent and sophisticated. She has a petite frame, with long, elegant, piano player's fingers, perfectly sized to deliver a gorgeous rendition of "Für Elise." She had been a standout student at Westinghouse High School and was one of the first Black women to ever study at Carnegie Mellon University. Mom-Mom would often say that knowledge was the only thing that the world couldn't take away from you. And she only cared about three things: education, education, and education.

She loved business-banking, finance, sales, contracts. Mom-Mom always had her own money.

Life moved quickly for my mother, as it often did in those days. She married her first husband at the age of twenty, had a daughter, and was divorced less than three years later. By twenty-five, as a struggling single mom, she was probably one of the most educated African American women in all of Pittsburgh, yet she was still working jobs beneath the level of her true potential. Feeling trapped and craving bigger opportunities, she packed up the baby and moved to live with her mother--my grandmother Gigi--in Philadelphia.

My parents met in the summer of 1964. Mom-Mom was working as a notary in the Fidelity Bank in Philly. She was rolling out with some girlfriends to a party, and one of them told her she just had to meet this man. His name was Will Smith.

In many ways, Mom-Mom is the total opposite of my father. Whereas Daddio was the boisterous, charismatic center of attention, Mom-Mom is quiet and reserved; not because she's shy or intimidated, but because she "only speaks when it improves on silence." She loves words and always chooses them carefully--she speaks with an academic sophistication. Daddio, on the other hand, was loud, spewing the lingo of a 1950s North Philly hood rat. He loved the poetry of his profanity--I once heard him call a man a "dirty rat, cocksuckin', low-down, mangy pig fucker."

Mom-Mom doesn't use profanity.

It's important to note here, that back in the day, Daddio was the man. Six foot two, smart, good-looking, the proud owner of a fire-engine-red convertible Pontiac. He was funny; he could sing; he could play the guitar. He could lock people into him--he was always the dude standing in the middle of a party with a drink in one hand and a cigarette in the other, a master storyteller who could keep a room buzzing.

When Mom-Mom first saw Daddio, he reminded her of a tall Marvin Gaye. He was savvy and knew his way around people. He could talk his way into a party, get free drinks and a table near the front. Daddio had a way of moving through the world like everything was under control, it was all going to be fine. This was comforting for my mom.

My mother's memory of their first days together is just a blurred montage of restaurants and clubs, strung together by a stream of jokes and laughter. Mom-Mom couldn't get over how funny he was, but most important to her, he was ambitious. He had his own business. He had employees. He wanted to work in white neighborhoods, with white people working for him.

Daddio was going places.

My father wasn't used to interacting with women of my mother's educational accomplishments--Man, this bird's smart as a muthafucka, he thought. Daddio was the street smarts to Mom-Mom's book smarts.

My parents had a lot in common, too. They both had a passion for music. They loved jazz, blues, and, later, funk and R&B. They lived through the glorious Motown days and spent much of it dancing together in musty basement parties and jazz clubs.

But there were strange commonalities, as well--the stuff that startles you and makes you think, This must be God's plan. Both of my parents had mothers who were nurses who worked night shifts (one was Helen; one was Ellen). Both of my parents had short-lived marriages in their early twenties, and they both had daughters. And in perhaps the strangest coincidence, they had both named their daughters Pam.

My parents got married in a small ceremony at Niagara Falls in 1966. Soon after, Daddio moved into my grandmother Gigi's house, on North Fifty-Fourth Street in West Philadelphia. It wasn't long before they combined their very different strengths and talents into an effective team. Mom-Mom ran Daddio's office: payroll, contracts, taxes, accounting, permits. And Daddio got to do what he did best: work hard and make money.

Both of my parents would later speak fondly of those early years. They were young, in love, ambitious, and they were movin' on up.

My full name is Willard Carroll Smith II--not Junior. Daddio would always correct people: 'Hey! He ain't no mutherfuckin' Junior.' He felt like calling me 'Junior' diminished both of us.

I was born on September 25, 1968. My mom says that from the moment I showed up, I was a talker. Always smiling, yapping, and babbling away, content to just be making noise.

Gigi worked the graveyard shift at Jefferson Hospital in Center City, Philadelphia, so she'd take care of me in the mornings while my parents were at work. Her house had a huge porch, which served as my front-row seat to the drama of North Fifty-Fourth Street, and a stage on which I could join in the theatrics. She'd prop me up on that porch and watch me jibber-jabber with anybody and everybody who walked by. Even at that age, I loved having an audience.

My twin brother and sister, Harry and Ellen, were born on May 5, 1971. And counting Mom-Mom's daughter Pam, just like that there would now be six of us under one roof.

Fortunately, the North Philly entrepreneur in Daddio was alive and well. He had gone from repairing refrigerators to installing and maintaining refrigerator and freezer cases in major supermarkets. Business was taking off-he was expanding beyond Philly into the surrounding suburbs. He started to build a fleet of trucks and hire a crew of refrigeration and electrical technicians. He also rented a small building to use as his base of operations.

Daddio was always hustling. I remember one particularly frigid winter, cash got tight, so he taught himself how to repair kerosene heaters. They were all the rage in Philly at the time. He put up a bunch of flyers, and people started bringing him their broken heaters. Daddio figured out that once he'd fixed a heater, he'd have to "test" it for a couple days, to make sure it was working. At any given time, he'd have ten or twelve kerosene heaters "being tested for the quality of his work." That many heaters will easily warm a West Philly row home, even in the coldest of winters. So Daddio canceled our gas service, kept his family warm and toasty for the winter, and got paid for it.

By the time that I was two years old, Daddio had established his business firmly enough to buy a house about a mile away from Gigi in a middle-class neighborhood of West Philly called Wynnefield.

I grew up at 5943 Woodcrest Avenue on a tree-lined street of thirty grayish-red brick row homes, all connected. The physical proximity of the houses cultivated a strong sense of community. (It also meant that if your neighbor had roaches, you had roaches, too.) Everybody knew everybody. For a young Black family in the 1970s, this was as American dream as you could get.

Across the street was Beeber Middle School and its majestic concrete playground. Basketball, baseball, girls jumpin' double Dutch. The ol' heads slap-boxing. And the second the summer hit, pop goes the water plug. Our neighborhood was thick with kids, and we were always outside playing. Living within one hundred yards of my house, there were almost forty kids my age. Stacey, David, Reecie, Cheri, Michael, Teddy, Shawn, Omarr, and on and on--and that's not even counting their siblings, or the kids on the next blocks. (Stacey Brooks is my oldest friend in the world. We met the day my family moved to Woodcrest. I was two, she was three. Our mothers pushed our strollers up to each other and introduced us. I was in love with her by the time I was seven. But she was in love with David Brandon. He was nine.)

Product details

• Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin Press (November 9, 2021)
• Language ‏ : ‎ English
• Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 432 pages
• ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1984877925
• ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1984877925
• Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 3.53 ounces
• Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.37 x 1.34 x 9.53 inches
• #65 in Black & African American Biographies
• #192 in Actor & Entertainer Biographies
• #689 in Memoirs (Books)

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About the author

Mark manson.

Mark Manson is the #1 New York Times Bestselling author of Everything is F*cked: A Book About Hope and The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck: A Counterintuitive Approach to Living a Good Life, the mega-bestseller that reached #1 in fourteen different countries. Mark’s books have been translated into more than 50 languages and have sold over 12 million copies worldwide.

Mark runs one of the largest personal growth websites in the world, MarkManson.net, a blog with more than two million monthly readers and half a million subscribers. His writing is often described as ‘self-help for people who hate self-help’ — a no-BS brand of life advice and cultural commentary that has struck a chord with people around the globe. His writing has appeared in The New York Times, Wall Street Journal, TIME Magazine, Forbes, Vice, CNN, and Vox, among many others. He currently lives in New York City.

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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.

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Will Smith Biography

Will Smith, an immensely popular American actor, began his career as a rap artist before making a successful transition into the world of movies. With a string of blockbuster films and numerous awards to his name, including an Academy Award and four Grammy Awards, Smith has proven himself to be a versatile and talented performer. From his debut in “Six Degrees of Separation” to his iconic role in the “Men in Black” series, Smith’s power-packed performances have captivated audiences worldwide. His ability to effortlessly portray both emotional and action-packed roles has earned him praise from directors and fans alike.

Quick Facts

• Nick Name: The Fresh Prince
• Also Known As: Willard Carroll Smith II
• Age: 55 Years, 55 Year Old Males
• Spouse/Ex-: Jada Pinkett Smith (m. 1997), Sheree Zampino (m. 1992–1995)
• Father: Willard Christopher Smith Sr.
• Mother: Caroline Bright
• Siblings: Ellen Smith, Harry Smith, Pam Smith
• Children: Jaden Smith, Trey Smith, Willow Smith
• Born Country: United States
• Quotes By Will Smith
• Height: 6’2″ (188 cm), 6’2″ Males
• U.S. State: Pennsylvania, African-American From Pennsylvania
• Personality: ENFP
• City: Philadelphia
• Founder/Co-Founder: Treyball Development Inc., Overbrook Entertainment, New Village Leadership Academy
• Humanitarian Work: Established the ‘New Village Leadership Academy’ elementary school

Childhood & Early Life

Willard Christopher Smith, Jr. was born on September 25, 1968, in Pennsylvania. His parents were Willard C. Smith, Sr., the proprietor of a refrigeration company, and Caroline, a member of the ‘School Board of Philadelphia’. He grew up in the neighbourhood of Wynnefield with his younger siblings Harry and Ellen, as well as an older sister Pamela. Smith had a Baptist upbringing at home but received his elementary education from a Catholic institution named ‘Our Lady of Lourdes’. After his parents separated, he attended ‘Overbrook High School’ in Philadelphia. Instead of attending college, he decided to pursue a career in music.

Smith met record producer and musician Jeffrey Townes, also known as DJ Jazzy Jeff, at a party, and the two formed a group with another friend called Ready Rock C. They became known as ‘DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince’ and gained popularity with songs like ‘Summertime’ and ‘Parents Just Don’t Understand’. In 1988-89, Smith faced trouble with the ‘Internal Revenue Service’ due to unpaid taxes, which almost led to bankruptcy. However, he was hired for the sitcom ‘The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’ in 1990, which brought him recognition as an actor.

Smith made his debut in feature films in 1993 with the movie ‘Six Degrees of Separation’. He gained further success with movies like ‘Bad Boys’, ‘Independence Day’, ‘Men in Black’, and ‘Enemy of the State’. He received an Academy Award nomination for his role in ‘Ali’. In the following years, he starred in movies like ‘I, Robot’, ‘Hitch’, ‘Pursuit of Happyness’, and ‘I Am Legend’. More recent works include ‘Focus’, ‘Concussion’, ‘Bad Boys For Life’, ‘Aladdin’, ‘Suicide Squad’, and ‘King Richard’.

Major Works

Smith is known for his roles in the ‘Men in Black’ franchise and his performance in ‘Pursuit of Happyness’, which earned him critical acclaim and award nominations.

Personal Life & Legacy

Smith was first married to actress Sheree Elizabeth Zampino, with whom he has a son named Trey. They divorced after three years. He then married actress Jada Koren Pinkett, and they have two children together, Jaden and Willow. Smith has been involved in philanthropy, donating to various organizations and establishing an elementary school called ‘New Village Leadership Academy’ with his wife.

Smith was originally offered the role of ‘Neo’ in ‘The Matrix’ but turned it down, and the role went to Keanu Reeves.

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O.J. Simpson, NFL star whose murder trial gripped the nation, dies of cancer at 76

O.J. Simpson , the former NFL star who was acquitted of murdering his ex-wife and her friend in a televised trial that gripped the nation, has died of cancer, according to his family.

"He was surrounded by his children and grandchildren," the family said in a statement posted on X . "During this time of transition, his family asks that you please respect their wishes for privacy and grace."

Reports circulated in February that Simpson had been diagnosed with prostate cancer and was in hospice care as he underwent chemotherapy. He denied that he was in hospice in a video posted on X, but did not address whether he'd been diagnosed with cancer.

“Hospice? Hospice? You talking ‘bout hospice?” he said in the video with a laugh, adding that he doesn’t know who started the rumors. 

Orenthal James Simpson played 11 seasons in the National Football League and was known as "The Juice" to his fans, but his sports legacy was tarnished forever in the 1990s after his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman were killed.

Brown Simpson, 35, and Goldman, 25, were found stabbed to death outside her Los Angeles home in 1994.

On June 13, 1994, Goldman was returning sunglasses that the mother of Brown Simpson had left at a restaurant where he worked. The two were stabbed and slashed dozens of times, and their bodies were found the next day.

When Los Angeles police officers went to Simpson's home to speak to him about the slayings, Simpson did not answer the door but officers noticed a trail of blood leading to his car, as well as blood on his car.

Once a revered athlete, Simpson went from a Hall of Fame icon to a murder suspect.

Days later, officials charged Simpson with the murders and he attempted to evade arrest, resulting in an infamous hourslong police chase along Southern California's highways in his white Ford Bronco .

Simpson's case went to trial in 1995 and was broadcast to millions of viewers across the nation. The court case was dubbed the "trial of the century" as it dragged on for months and transformed into a public spectacle.

Feelings over the trial have remained mixed over the years, with many accusing the Los Angeles Police Department of racism in its handling of the case. Others believe that Simpson's ability to retain high-powered attorneys allowed him to get away with murder.

The trial made prosecutors Christopher Darden and Marcia Clark household names, in addition to Simpson's defense attorneys Johnnie Cochran, Alan Dershowitz and Robert Kardashian.

He was acquitted of both murders in a controversial verdict. Two years later, he was found civilly liable for wrongful death in the double homicide case.

Despite his acquittal in the criminal trial, many still believed Simpson was guilty, a belief bolstered by a jury ordering him to pay $33 million to Goldman's family in the civil case — damages that were never paid in full.

Goldman's father, Fred Goldman, spoke to NBC News by phone Thursday and described Simpson's death as "no great loss."

“The only thing I have to say is it’s just further reminder of Ron being gone all these years," he said. "It’s no great loss to the world. It’s a further reminder of Ron’s being gone.”

Bob Costas, the sports broadcaster who worked with Simpson for years at NBC Sports covering the NFL, said Simpson leaves behind “a complicated legacy, to put it mildly.”

“I can’t think of anyone historical or someone that we may have known where the first chapter and the second chapter of their lives are such a stark contrast … revered and then reviled,” Costas said on NBC’s “TODAY” show Friday.

In 2007, Simpson led an armed robbery attempt of a sports memorabilia dealer in Las Vegas. He argued in court that he was recovering his own stolen items, but his defense failed to sway the jury.

He was convicted and sentenced to 33 years in prison, of which he served only nine before he was released on parole .

Simpson spoke to The Associated Press by phone in 2019 , telling them that he was healthy and happy living in Las Vegas. He maintained that he believed his robbery conviction was unfair, but said: “I believe in the legal system and I honored it. I served my time.”

The Simpson murder trial was re-enacted and relitigated decades later in FX’s “The People v. O.J. Simpson,” an installment of the network’s popular “American Crime Story” series in 2016. Released that same year was the Academy Award-winning documentary "O.J.: Made in America," detailing Simpson's rise and fall.

Simpson was born in San Francisco and raised in public housing, going to a local community college before transferring to the University of Southern California. He was part of the school's national championship in 1967 and earned the Heisman Trophy the next year.

He was drafted by the Buffalo Bills in 1969 as a No. 1 overall pick.

According to NBC Sports , Simpson was the first player in the league to rush for 2,000 or more yards in a season and is considered the best running back of his era.

Simpson had three children from his first marriage to Marguerite Whitley, one of whom died in a drowning accident as a toddler.

He also shared two children with Brown Simpson.

Following her murder and his acquittal, Simpson won custody of their shared children and moved to Miami with them. His custody fight with his former-in-laws also drew headlines as the children's grandparents took him to court in a bitter legal battle.

Doha Madani is a senior breaking news reporter for NBC News. Pronouns: she/her.