Will Smith

Will Smith was born on September 25, 1968 in Philadelphia. His carefree character led him to be renowned as ‘prince’, due to the ease he had to get out of any kind of problem. However, Will was a very good student. He graduated from Overbook High School, where his academic results earned him entry into the Julia Reynolds Masterman Laboratory and Demonstration School, a high-level college preparatory center, and a scholarship to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, the famed MIT. He finally declined these offers, to dedicate himself to his musical career. From the union with his friend Jeff Townes, ‘DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince’ was born. Together they achieved success, sold millions of records and two Grammys, which must be added to the two that Smith won alone, one of them for the central theme ofMen in Black .

Things were going well for the ‘prince’, who was beginning to stand out as a little ‘showman’. It caught the attention of Benny Medina, who had the idea of ​​making a television series based on it. Thus was born The Prince of Bel-Air (1990), which was on the air for six years. The character didn’t have much acting interest, as Will played himself: a young guy from Philadelphia with a passion for rap, a jokester and a bit of a thug, who moves to California. However, the reality was that little by little the musician became an actor. He made his film debut as a secondary in the drama Where the Day Takes You (1998), and a year later he was the boyfriend of the daughter of the character played by Whoopi Goldber inMade in America , where he also participated in the soundtrack.

The archetypal character of the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air had many ballots to take away a possible acting career for Will. In fact, the residue of the comedian and hooligan Will Smith will always be in the actor, although he has also known how to show other faces. He did so inSix Degrees of Separation (1993), alongside Donald Sutherland and Ian McKellen , where he played a mysterious and disturbing character. However, it had to be her comic encore that gave her the first blockbuster. It was inTwo Bad Boys (1995), along with Martin Lawrence , where action and humor were mixed equally in the resolution of a narcotics case. Michael Bay directed this success that in 2003 had its sequel inTwo Rebel Policemen II . The recipe for laughter and adrenaline was repeated inIndependence Day (1996), another blockbuster, this time with overtones of catastrophic science fiction, where Will Smith was the main character who had to save Earth from aliens. Things couldn’t go better, since a year later came Men In Black , one of the highest grossing movies of all time, where Tommy Lee Jones and ‘King Midas Smith’ worked controlling aliens passing through Earth. This film also had its sequel inMen in black 2 (2002). Barry Sonnenfeld , director of the saga of the men in black, relied on Will forWild Wild West (1999), a modern western. The public supported the project moderately, although Will helped him win two Razzie, the anti-Oscar. However, the greatest danger Will faced was once again typecasting. He began to move away from the newly created cliché; he was inPublic enemy (1998), where the action was linked to the thriller and not to humor. One more step wasThe Legend of Bagger Vance (2000), by Robert Redford , a sports drama about golf.

And it was time to show that the funny guy in the class could get good grades. Michael Mann offered him to be the protagonist of the biopic about the boxer Cassius Clay. Smith prepared conscientiously forAli (2001) and his effort earned him an Oscar nomination. She beat out labels and those who thought she didn’t know how to do anything other than sing, dance, tell jokes and shoot by KO. In addition, this film allowed him to work with his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith , who appeared as a secondary. The couple had married in 1997, two years after Will’s divorce from his first wife, Sheree Smith.

Away from the ghosts of typecasting, Smith starred in and produced the futuristic filmI, Robot (2004) andHitch (2005), a romantic comedy. She is now facing her second Oscar nomination thanks toThe Pursuit of Happiness , a drama about the true story of Chris Gardner, a man who after losing everything and becoming homeless, ended up a millionaire. One of the aggravating factors in Gardner’s story is that he had to face eviction in the company of his youngest son, the great reason for his daily struggle. Will’s real son, Jaden Smith , plays this character, which has made his father very proud. Thus, he adds this experience to the vice clip ‘Just the Two of Us’, where Will shared a scene with another of his sons, Trey. Perhaps one of them, or his daughter Willow, wants to follow in his father’s footsteps towards the impossible.