Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith have been the talk of the celebrity world this year — but there’s one surprising fact fans had missed about their family!
Exactly why Jaden and Willow are named the way they are…
Scroll on to find out!
Now, Will Smith has been through a hell of a lot over the last few years…
Particularly when it comes to his personal life.
As we know, things kicked off for Will when Jada Pinkett Smith’s alleged affair thrust the pair into the spotlight.
For years now, rumors of infidelity between her and her husband, Will Smith, have been rife… But a whole new rumor emerged.
Reports had been alleging eye-opening new details about the pair’s marriage…
And shockingly the situation continued to develop as Will also admitted that he “cheated” on his wife.
The couple initially met all the way back in 1994.
Jada was only nineteen when she auditioned to play the role of Will’s girlfriend in the hit sitcom, Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.
But the pair hit it off right away.
At 6’2, Will towers over Jada, who is only 5′. But from the audition, Will and Jada built a friendship that soon turned into a romance.
Though Will was married to Sheree Fletcher at the time when they met…
In an interview with Access, Jada admitted that Will was still technically married when they started dating. “He was ‘div’,” she said. “The ‘orced’ hadn’t happened yet.” Will and Sheree divorced in 1995 and they continued to share custody of their son, Trey.
It didn’t take long for Will to make his moves on Jada…
Upon the breakdown of his marriage, Will had asked Jada if she was “seeing anyone,” and her response was “no.” “Cool, you’re seeing me now,” Will had smoothly told her.
They appeared to be the perfect couple…
And, just 2 years later in 1997, Will and Jada had tied the knot in a private ceremony at the Cloisters Mansion in Jada’s hometown of Baltimore.
It wasn’t long after they announced Jada was pregnant with their first child…
Jaden, who is twenty-three, was born a year after they married, followed by Willow, who is twenty-one.
Both Jaden and Willow have embarked on careers as musicians since they were teenagers and they’re now proving to be very popular, particularly in the hip-hop and rap scene.
The Smiths seem like the perfect family…
But nothing is ever as perfect as it seems, right?
And sadly that seems to be the case for Jada and Will…
In 2013, fans went wild when Jada allegedly hinted that she and Will were in an open relationship.
During a HuffPost Live Interview back in 2013, Jada confirmed the rumors…
“I’ve always told Will, ‘You can do whatever you want as long as you can look at yourself in the mirror and be okay.’ Because, at the end of the day, Will is his own man. I’m here as his partner, but he is his own man. He has to decide who he wants to be and that’s not for me to do for him. Or vice versa.”
Taking to Facebook shortly after the interview, Jada opened her post with the question, “Open marriage?…”
She then explained: “The statement I made in regard to, ‘Will can do whatever he wants,’ has illuminated the need to discuss the relationship between trust and love and how they co-exist.”
On TIDAL’s Rap Radar podcast in 2018, Will also opened up about their marriage…
He said: “We don’t even say we’re married anymore. We refer to ourselves as ‘life partners,’ where you get into that space where you realize you are literally with somebody for the rest of your life. There are no deal-breakers. There’s nothing she could do – ever – nothing that would break our relationship.”
This solidified rumors about the couple’s unique relationship.
However, shortly after, a whole new spanner was thrown into the works.
In 2020, singer August Alsina came forward with some pretty eye-opening claims about Jada…
He had hinted strongly that he had engaged in a consensual relationship with Jada in his song “Nunya.”
And, to make this story even more scandalous…
He alleged that the relationship, which spanned over several years, “was approved by her husband Will.” What?
In an interview with The Breakfast Club’s Angela Yee, August said…
“I actually sat down with Will and had a conversation. Due to the transformation from their marriage to their life partnership that they spoken on several times, and not involving romanticism, he gave me his blessing.”
He continued…
“I totally gave myself to that relationship for years of my life. I truly and really, really deeply loved, and have a ton of love for her. I devoted myself to it, I gave my full self to it. So much so to the point that I can die right now and be OK with knowing that I truly gave myself to somebody,” he said.
He concluded…
“I really loved the person that I experienced that [with] and know what [that feels] like – if some people never get that in this lifetime.”
After August’s controversial comments…
Jada took to The Red Table to discuss the issue.
Okay, anyone who is familiar with the Smith family will be aware of their infamous Red Table.
Jada, alongside her daughter, Willow, hosts her own online chat show, Red Table Talk, where people sit around a red table, or sometimes on a red couch, and talk candidly about their own personal issues and experiences.
The full Smith family has appeared on Red Table Talk several times before…
And Will and Jada have candidly talked about their own relationship and family life.
But in this particular episode, she confessed it all…
And, just months later, Will Smith also made some admissions of his own…
In a cover story with GQ Magazine in September 2021, the actor confessed that he also had other s*xual relations during his marriage to Jada.
“Jada never believed in conventional marriage… Jada had family members that had an unconventional relationship,” he said. “So she grew up in a way that was very different than how I grew up. There were significant endless discussions about, what is relational perfection? What is the perfect way to interact as a couple? And for the large part of our relationship, monogamy was what we chose, not thinking of monogamy as the only relational perfection.”
He continued: “The pursuit of truth is the only way to be happy in this lifetime and we sort of came to the agreement that authenticity was the release from the shackles of fame and public scrutiny.”
The author of the GQ piece revealed that Will explained to them, that Jada wasn’t the only one that was “unfaithful” but didn’t elaborate on the details.
“We have given each other trust and freedom, with the belief that everybody has to find their own way,” Will told the publication.
“And marriage for us can’t be a prison. And I don’t suggest our road for anybody. I don’t suggest this road for anybody. But the experiences that the freedoms that we’ve given one another and the unconditional support, to me, is the highest definition of love,” he added.
The Smith family has been thrown into the spotlight a lot in recent months, especially after the events that unfolded during this year’s Oscars.
When Will punched Chris Rock on stage after he made a joke about Jada.
But one person began talking about Will for an entirely different reason…
Viola Davis has opened up about how a conversation with Will helped to change her entire life perspective.
Viola opened up about Smith changing her perspective in her new memoir titled, Finding Me.
Too Fab reports that Viola explained that Smith helped her change her outlook and confront her childhood trauma during a filming break while on the set of Suicide Squad.
Will is said to have asked Viola: “Viola, who are you?”
“Look, I’m always going to be that 15-year-old boy whose girlfriend broke up with him,” Will said. “That’s always going to be me. So, who are you?”
According to USA Today, she continued writing: “There I was, a working actress with steady gigs, Broadway credits, multiple industry awards, and a reputation of bringing professionalism and excellence to any project. Hell, Oprah knew who I was.”
“Yet, sitting there conversing with Will Smith, I was still that little, terrified, third-grade Black girl.”
The outlet reports that Viola detailed in the memoir about repeated racist abuse that she experienced while in third grade.
And now, Will has been promoting his upcoming new movie Emancipation.
He appeared on Monday night’s episode of The Daily Show with Trevor Noah where he opened up about the night of the Oscars.
He said that when he got home after the ceremony, his 9-year-old nephew was waiting and had seen the slap…
“My little nephew Dom is nine. He is the sweetest little boy.
“He had stayed up late to see his uncle Will and we are sitting in my kitchen and he is on my lap and he is holding the Oscar and he is just like, ‘Why did you hit that man, Uncle Will?’” Will said.
He then took out his tissues and looked at Noah, and said: “Damn it. Why are you trying to Oprah me?”
Will added: “It was a mess, you know. I don’t want to go too far into it to give people more to misunderstand.”
The actor continued to open up about what he said was, “a horrific night, as you can imagine.”
“There’s many nuances and complexities to it. But at the end of the day, I just — I lost it, you know?
“I was going through something that night, you know? Not that that justifies my behavior at all,” Will admitted.
He added that it was a build-up of emotions…
And that it had a lot to do with his childhood trauma.
“It was a lot of things. It was the little boy that watched his father beat up his mother, you know?
“All of that just bubbled up in that moment. That is not who I want to be,” he said.
“I was gone. That was a rage that had been bottled for a really long time.”
Since opening up about the Oscars incident…
Will and Jada have graced the red carpet for his latest movie, Emancipation.
This is the couple’s first red carpet-appearance following the Oscars slap earlier this year.
Will reportedly wore a maroon-colored suit with a light-pink button-down.
As for Jada, she was seen wearing a white turtleneck dress with a dramatic ruffled cape train designed by Stéphane Rolland.
The couple appeared with their family with their daughter, Willow, wearing a black button-down vest and trousers with crystal-embellished hip cutouts from Stella McCartney’s spring/summer 2023 ready-to-wear collection.
Jayden, on the other hand, was seen wearing a suit completely covered in black-and-white photos.
And his eldest son, Trey Smith, was seen wearing a plum jacket and light pink shirt.
Appearing on the red carpet, Will was interviewed about his new movie, with Fox 5 reporter Kevin McCarthy, talking about the controversy that’s been haunting him since he slapped Chris Rock.
“I completely understand that if someone is not ready. I would absolutely respect that and allow them their space to not be ready,” Will said.
“My deepest concern is my team—director Antoine Fuqua has done what I think is the greatest work of his entire career.”
He added: “My deepest hope is that my actions don’t penalize my team.”
But Twitter has been totally distracted by something else entirely.
The names of the Smith kids, Willow and Jaden.
“My mind is blown,” wrote one fan.
“I was today years old when I realized that Will Smith and Jada named their kids the opposite s*x versions of their names and my mind is blown. Will-Willow, Jada-Jaden,” another pointed out.
“I’m absolutely mindblown by the fact that I just now have realized that willow and jaden smith are named slightly after their parents will and jada!” added a third.
Had you ever noticed this?
