After being linked to Dalvin DeGrate of Jodeci, Grant Hill, and Wesley Snipes, Jada Pinkett married Will Smith in 1997. They have weathered numerous storms, including rumors about their open marriage and Jada coming clean about her entanglement with August Alsina.
We didn’t just wake up one day and discover Will and Jada’s marriage is a hot mess. In fact, despite their tendency to give all the TMI details about their bedroom activities, there has always been something a little strange about their relationship.
Here are all the red flags in Will Smith and Jada Pinkett’s marriage
Jada Pinkett dated Will Smith while he was still married
Will and Jada briefly met when she auditioned to play the role of his character’s girlfriend on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. The role was given to Nia Long instead. Later on, when Will saw Jada on A Different World, he realized he was extremely attracted to her — despite being married to Sheree Zampino (pictured above) at the time. They also share a son named Trey.
Will revealed on an episode of Red Table Talk that while out to dinner with Sheree, he went into the restroom and realized he was married to the wrong woman, but he didn’t believe in divorce. He stated, “I went back out, sat down with Sheree, and started going back on with my life.”
It wasn’t until Sheree decided to end their marriage that Will pounced on Jada. He asked her if she was seeing anyone, and when she said no, Will replied, “Cool, you’re seeing me now.”
From there, Jada moved from Baltimore to California, and they began dating while Will finalized his divorce and worked on co-parenting with Sheree.
Jada Pinkett never wanted to get married
By 1995, Will was officially a single man, and his and Jada’s relationship continued, although they spent a lot of time apart due to their work commitments.
After two years of dating, Jada found out she was pregnant with their son Jaden. 29-year-old Will popped the question in late 1997 with a $250,000 engagement ring, and 26-year-old Jada accepted his proposal…under duress.
During an episode of Red Table Talk, Jada said she never wanted to get married, but she was under a lot of pressure because she was young and pregnant. It was her mom, Adrienne, who pushed her into tying the knot. Adrienne said that since Jada was her only child, she was worried she would never have the experience of seeing her daughter get married.
Jada decided to go through with it, but she didn’t want a typical wedding. And Will admitted in his memoir that he pressured her into having a traditional ceremony.
One month after the proposal, they got married at a private New Year’s Eve ceremony in Baltimore in front of 100 guests.
Jada said she was about three months pregnant during the ceremony. She was dealing with morning sickness and was being very unpleasant and uncooperative the entire day. Not only was she feeling unwell, but she didn’t even want to be there. She said, “I was so upset that I had to have a wedding. I cried the whole way down the aisle!”
Many brides experience pre-wedding jitters since marriage is a major life transition. But a wedding therapist named Landis Bejar told Insider website that bad nerves can indicate the person isn’t ready for marriage or that they’re marrying the wrong person.
From that point on, Will has explained what it’s like to be married to a woman that didn’t want to get married in the first place. In his memoir, he wrote, “This would be the first of many compromises Jada would make over the years that painfully negated her own values.”
Jada Pinkett struggled with family life
Jada didn’t even want to take on the tradition of taking his last name. In a Facebook post, she wrote that she feared she would be criticized for failing to be an ”independent woman” by sticking to tradition.
Jada eventually decided to add Smith to her original moniker, but the issues in their marriage continued.
They welcomed their daughter Willow in October 2000, and Jada told BET’s Raq Rants she had a lot of resentment and found it difficult to cope with the restrictions of parenthood.
As Will’s career continued to flourish, he noticed Jada would wake up many mornings in tears. In his memoir, he wrote that Jada made many sacrifices for their family and put her own desires on hold.
Things got even worse when Will persuaded Jada to move into a massive 256-acre Calabasas compound that she didn’t even want to purchase. In his memoir, Will wrote, “Nothing good comes from spending your hard-earned money on a ‘family home’ that your wife doesn’t want.”
So, let’s see… Not only was Jada against marriage and the ceremony, but she struggled through parenthood and was opposed to living in the lap of luxury with her family.
But still, Will held on and tried to make their marriage work. He called his first divorce from Sheree the “worst thing” he had gone through in his adult life, and he didn’t want to go through that again.
The real reason Jada Pinkett and Will Smith separated in 2011
He started preparing for Jada’s 40th birthday party three years in advance, although Jada made it clear she only wanted to have a small gathering.
On the night of the 2011 event, which was held in Santa Fe, New Mexico, Will surprised her with a 3-day birthday extravaganza, complete with a documentary he’d commissioned that chronicled her life and traced her family’s lineage back to slavery.
When they got back to their hotel suite that night, Jada told him, “That was the most disgusting display of ego I have ever seen in my life.”
Jada called off the rest of the birthday celebration, and Will was shocked. He thought he was being the perfect husband. They had an explosive fight, which led to a separation and Will told her he was retiring from trying to make her happy.
During their separation, he went to a tantric intimacy expert and visited a shaman to receive some doses of a psychotropic tea to help him cope. Eventually, he and Jada reconciled.
Is Jada Pinkett’s heart still with Tupac Shakur?
Can you imagine spending three years planning someone’s birthday party, only for them to be unappreciative of your efforts? Well, many believe that Jada’s attitude stems from Will being nothing more than a rebound relationship that she’s tied to.
Jada has frequently spoken about her friendship with her high school friend, the late Tupac Shakur, who passed away in September 1997…three months before Jada and Will got married.
Jada claims she and Tupac shared a kiss, but things never got physical between them. A poem Tupac wrote for Jada talks about their friendship but tells a slightly different story.
Will and Jada’s daughter Willow even wrote a letter to the deceased rapper. The letter, which was posted on Willow’s social media account, was later deleted.
Why would Willow be so moved to write a letter like this? Someone (Jada) was clearly feeding her information about her connection to the deceased rapper. Tsk Tsk.
And when Jada shared Tupac’s “Lost Soulz” poem in honor of what would have been his 50th birthday, online users went crazy. One person commented: “Will Smith has been the best in everything else except in Jada’s heart,” while another online user wrote, “Will Smith has been Jada’s rebound for nearly three decades now.” Ouch.
In his memoir, Will admitted he felt “tortured” by the bond Jada and Tupac shared. He also admitted he felt a sense of relief as he and Jada’s relationship progressed and she spent less and less time with Tupac.
Jada’s the reason she and Will are no longer monogamous
Will told GQ that at some point, his and Jada’s relationship stopped being monogamous because Jada never believed in a conventional marriage. He told the magazine, “We have given each other trust and freedom, with the belief that everybody has to find their own way. And marriage for us can’t be a prison.”
In 2011, rumors emerged that Jada was having an affair with her Hawthorne co-star, Marc Anthony, who was married to Jennifer Lopez at the time. A source told UsWeekly Jada and Marc never had a full-blown romantic affair, but they did get “inappropriately close.”
From there, there have been countless rumors about the Smiths having an open marriage. In 2020, Jada eventually came clean that she had an intimate relationship with R & B singer August Alsina during a period when she and Will were separated. August also claimed Will gave his blessing for their affair, and Will and Jada denied that allegation.
While people continue to feel sorry for Will having to share his wife with other people, he told GQ magazine that Jada wasn’t the only one engaging in relationships outside their marriage. Is he referring to the 2015 rumors that he was having an affair with his Focus costar Margot Robbie? We’re not certain, but it sure sounds like it.
Jada Pinkett and Will Smith no longer refer to themselves as ‘married’
In 2018, Will told Rap Radar he and Jada no longer refer to themselves as married. Instead, they describe themselves as life partners. He added, “There’s no deal breakers. There’s nothing she could do—ever—nothing that would break our relationship. She has my support til death, and it feels so good to get to that space.”
The fact that Jada never wanted to get married in the first place really explains the state of their marriage today. But perhaps she stays with Will because she knows she’s free to do whatever she wants, and Will will stand up, protect her, and love her no matter what. In a 2008 appearance on The Ellen Degeneres Show, Will boldly stated: “Divorce just can’t be an option.”
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