Will Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, admitted that she “truly didn’t want to get married.”
In fact, the “Matrix” actress admitted to “weeping down the freaking aisle” before marrying the “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” actor on New Year’s Eve in 1997, despite Smith’s infamous Oscars smack-down of Chris Rock and the Academy’s decision Friday to ban him from the ceremony for ten years.
“I was under so much pressure, you know, being a young actress, being young, and I was just, like, pregnant, and I didn’t know what to do,” said Pinkett Smith, 50, in a recently resurrected excerpt from her Facebook series “Red Table Talk.” “I had no desire to be married.”
Pinkett Smith candidly recalls her mother, Adrienne Banfield-Norris, also known as “Gammy,” 68, forcing her and Smith to marry after she became pregnant with their first son, Jaden, now 23, in a clip from 2018 that has resurfaced amid renewed controversy surrounding her louche “entanglement” with R&B singer August Alsina, 29.
“I didn’t want to be married,” Pinkett Smith reiterated as she sat at the circular table with her mother, Smith, 53, and their daughter Willow, 21.
Pinkett-Smith confessed to never wanting to get married during an episode of “Red Table Talk.”
“We only got married because Gammy was crying,” a chuckling Smith informed Willow.
“It was almost as if Gammy was saying, ‘You have to get married, so let’s speak about the wedding,’” Pinkett Smith added, prompting Banfield-Norris to admit, “I remember feeling very passionately and wanting you guys to get married.”
Pinkett Smith’s mother was only 18 when she became pregnant with her daughter, and she married her father, Robsol Pinkett Jr., for a short time.
“I remember wanting you and Will to marry,” Banfield-Norris continued, “but I don’t recall your rejection of the idea of marriage.” “I recall being turned down for a wedding but not for a marriage.”
After that, Pinkett Smith reported being browbeaten into submitting to Big Day.
“And now Gammy’s gone to Will and cried about ‘I don’t want a wedding,’ and now I’m being pushed to have a wedding,” she explained. “All I wanted was for it to be just the two of us on a mountain because I was like, ‘This is serious business,’” she says.
Pinkett-Smith said the wedding was “horrible,” and was admittedly experiencing pregnancy sickness during her nuptials. Pinkett Smith said the wedding was “horrible,” and was admittedly experiencing pregnancy sickness during her nuptials.
Jada and Will tied the knot in the Gothic-style Cloisters Castle in a Baltimore suburb. Despite the beautiful setting, Pinkett Smith and her mother both admitted that it was less than ideal.
Banfield-Norris admitted, “The wedding was dreadful.” “It was a disaster.” Jada was sick, and she was a thorn in my side… She refused to cooperate in any way.”
“And I was so upset that I had to have a wedding,” Pinkett Smith concurred, laughing. I was so enraged that I sobbed my way down the stinking aisle. “I cried the entire time I was walking down the aisle.”
Smith, on the other hand, was delightfully ecstatic on their wedding day, having won his first Oscar in March for a brilliant depiction of Venus and Serena Williams’ father, Richard Williams, 80, in the feature film “King Richard.”
During the episode, he claimed, “There wasn’t a day in my life when I didn’t want to be married and have a family.” “I’ve been imagining my family since I was about five years old.”
Pinkett Smith’s visceral aversion to their nuptials notwithstanding, she and Smith ultimately agreed that getting hitched was, in fact, “the right call.”
Banfield-Norris also expressed regret for not respecting her daughter’s objections to a wedding and for being “selfish” in insisting on a grandiose event because Pinkett Smith is her only child.
The resurfaced “Red Table Talk” tape follows the discovery of new material from the couple’s tumultuous recent history.
In an Instagram Live video from 2019, a visibly irritated Smith chastised his wife for broadcasting him on social media without his permission.
“Don’t just start filming me without asking,” Smith remarked, responding to Pinkett Smith’s question, “Would you say [therapist Esther Perel] has been crucial in you and I redefining our relationship?”
“My social media presence is my bread and butter,” Smith said when the actress dismissed her husband’s outrage as “foolishness.” So you won’t be able to use me solely for social networking. I’m standing in my house, so don’t simply start rolling. “Do not begin rolling.”
Will and Jada Pinkett Smith have yet to make a public statement about the unearthed footage.