![]() Rap musician with duo DJ Jazzy Jeff and the Fresh Prince, 1986 - actor appearing on television in The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, National Broadcasting Company (NBC), 1990 - and in films, including Where the Day Takes You, 1992, Made in America, 1993, and Six Degrees of Separation, 1994. Education: Graduated from Overbrook High School, 1986. My folks At a Glance …īorn September 25, 1968, in Philadelphia, PA son of Willard (a refrigeration engineer) and Caroline (a school board employee) Smith married Sheree Zampino, 1992 children: Will III. Mom worked as a school secretary -she ’s a supervisor now -and her thing was education. He ’s a steady and positive figure in my life. ’ He was an independent businessman -he set up refrigeration in supermarkets -and he always provided for us. ![]() He ’d get this look that said, ‘One more step, Will, and it ’ll get ugly. “Dad was tough but not tyrannical, ” Smith told Essence. His parents were loving but demanding, the kind who took their children to Mount Rushmore on vacation to prove that education does not end with the classroom. He was the oldest son and one of five children of a refrigeration engineer and a school board employee. Willard Smith, Jr., was born and raised in Wynnefield, Pennsylvania, a middle-class suburb of West Philadelphia. Well, my mission has been to make him more real, and I suppose that means more like me. Now, as a TV character, he ’s accused of being unreal. As a rapper, some people knocked him for being too middle-class, too clean-cut. “He operates on several different levels -a symbol of urban youth, a symbol of black youth and, most specifically, of black male youth. “Look what the Fresh Prince represents, ” Smith told Essence magazine. He has worked hard over the years to invest some realism into the character he plays on The Fresh Prince of Bel Air -even if that means flying in the face of stereotype. ”Īcting, for Smith, has often meant being his own quirky self in front of a camera. ![]() Premiere magazine contributor Veronica Chambers cited Smith for his “white-bread appeal that very few black men possess, ” noting that the engaging star is “Ben Franklin with a backward baseball cap. In the mid-1990s, while still a young man by any standards, Smith is in demand for television and film roles, some of which seriously test his acting talent. With his accomplishment in the music industry behind him, Smith moved to television situation comedy and scored a hit with The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. While still too young to drink legally, he released several platinum rap albums and won the first-ever Grammy Award given in the rap category. Smith has enjoyed vast success in two different fields of popular entertainment. In real life he is Will Smith, a streetwise Philadelphian who has -by virtue of hard work and infectious charm -found stardom and wealth in Los Angeles. On television he is the Fresh Prince of Bel Air, a streetwise Philadelphian sent to live with wealthy relatives in California.
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