Jada Pinkett Smith is an American Actress and host of a talk show. She is also the co-host of ‘Facebook watch’ and ‘Red Table Talk,’ for which she received a Daytime Emmy Award. The paper magazine ‘Time’ named her “One of the 100 most influential people in the world” in 2021.

Jada Smith’s key facts 

● Jada Smith’s annual income is around $5 million 

● She earns approximately $420,000 per month

Her mother named Jada Korean Pinkett after her favorite soap actress Jada Rowland. She was born in Baltimore, Maryland. Her mother was the head nurse of a Baltimore inner-city clinic, and her father ran a construction company. Banfield became pregnant in high school. The couple got married but was divorced after several months. 

Her mother and grandmother raised Jada. Banfield noticed her granddaughter’s passion for performing in arts, and then they enrolled her in piano, tap dance, and ballet lessons. Jada Pinkett attended the Baltimore School for Arts, where she became close friends with her classmate Tupac Shakur. She majored in dance and theatre and graduated in 1989. After graduation, she spent a year at the North Carolina School of the Arts. 

Jada Smith’s Career 

Film and television career 

Jada started her acting career in 1990 when she starred in an episode of ‘True Colors. She also received guest roles in TV shows like ‘Doogie Howser,’ ‘M.D.’ and ‘21 Jump Street. In 1993, Jada appeared in her first film ‘Menace II Society’ where she was cast as a single mother. She considered dropping out of the movie after Shakur was fired, but he convinced her to take the role. 

In 1994, Jada acted with Keene Ivory Wayans in the action and comedy film ‘A Low Down Dirty Shame. Her character ‘Peaches’ is raw with a major attitude, and her acting gained many positive reviews. In the same year, Jada also starred as a title character in Doug McHenry’s romantic drama ‘Jason’s Lyric’ opposite Allen Payne. And also she had a role in the romantic comedy-drama ‘The Inkwell’ in the same year. 

Pinkett played a convict in the horror film ‘Demon Knight’ in 1995. According to Larenz, Jada was set to appear in the movie ‘Dead Presidents,’ but she turned down the role due to her loyalty to Shakur. 

Jada starred with Edie Murphy in the remake of ‘The Nutty Professor in 1996. The film was a commercial success and earned $25 million in the first weekend in North America and $247 million worldwide. She also had a lead role in ‘Set It Off’ where four women rob a bank to

escape poverty, opposite Queen Latifah, Vivica A. Fox and Kimberly Elise. The film made $41 million globally. 

In 1997, Jada had a cameo role in ‘Scream 2’ as a college student who was murdered in front of hundreds of filmgoers. She played a news reporter in the ‘Return to Paradise’ opposite Joaquin Phoenix and Vince Vaughn. She next starred in Spike Lee’s film Bamboozled (2000) as a personal assistant to the main character, played by Damon Wayans. The film made more than $100 million at the North American box office. 

In 2001, Pinkett Smith portrayed a loud-mouthed wife in the moderately successful comedy Kingdom Come, with LL Cool J, Vivica A. Fox, Anthony Anderson, Toni Braxton, and Whoopi Goldberg. In the same year, she played Sonji Roi, the first wife of boxer Muhammad Ali, opposite Will Smith in the biographical sports drama Ali. 

Commercial Success 

Perhaps her best-known role to date is the part of human rebel Niobe in the films The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions. Both films were released in 2003 and are sequels to 1999’s The Matrix, and the related video game Enter The Matrix was also released in 2003. In 2004, Jada played a U.S. Justice Department along with Jamie Fox and Tom Cruise in the neo-noir thriller Collateral.’ The film was a critical and commercial success, grossing $217.8 million worldwide. 

In 2007, she played the wife of an affluent dentist in Reign Over Me with Adam Sandler, Don Cheadle, Liv Tyler, and Donald Sutherland. ‘Entertainment Weekly’ called the film a “strange, black-and-blue drama equally mottled with likable good intentions and agitating clumsiness” and found Pinkett Smith “graceful” in it. 

Pinkett Smith was an executive producer and starred as a Chief Nursing Officer in the TNT medical drama Hawthorne, which premiered on June 16, 2009. While she reprised the voice role of Gloria in Madagascar 3: Europe’s Most Wanted (2012), which made over US$746 million, she also voiced the character in the NBC Christmas unique Merry Madagascar (2009) and the film Madly Madagascar. 

In 2014, Pinkett Smith starred in the FOX crime drama ‘Gotham’s first season. In 2015, she starred in the comedy ‘Magic Mike XXL’ as the manager of a star stripper club, opposite Channing Tatum and Joe Manganiello.

The film made the US $122.5 million worldwide. In 2017, Jada Smith took on the role of a nurse and an uptight mom in the comedy film ‘Girls Trip.’ This film was chosen by Time magazine as one of its top ten films of 2017 and grossed US$140 million worldwide, including over US$100 million domestically.

Later Career 

Beginning in May 2018, Pinkett Smith, her mother, Adrienne Banfield-Norri, and her daughter Williow Smith hosted the Facebook Watch talk show ‘Red Table Talk,’ which focuses on a wide range of topics. In 2021, ‘Red Table Talk’ won a Daytime Emmy Award in the outstanding informative talk show category. 

Musical Career 

Jada began to direct music videos in 1995. She led the music video “ I’m Going Down” and “How many Times” and also appeared in those videos. Pinkett Smith came up with the concept for his “California Love” music video, which she had intended to direct, but she removed herself 

from the project. In 1996, Pinkett ran the music video “Keep On, Keepin’ On” by MC Lyte Feat. Xscape. 

The band’s self-titled debut album was released on February 21, 2006, by Pinkett Smith’s production company, 100% Womon, and Suburban Noize Records. Will Smith served as the project’s executive producer. The album made it to Billboard’s Top Heatseekers chart and peaked at number 44 during the week of March 11, 2006. 

Jada Smith’s Other Ventures 

Business 

Pinkett Smith created her fashion label ‘Maja’ in 1994. The clothing line features women’s T-shirts and dresses embellished with the slogan “Sister Power,” sold primarily through small catalogs. In 2003, Pinkett Smith and Smith helped create the television series ‘All of Us, which aired on UPN. Jada Smith published her first children’s book, ‘Girls Hold Up This World, in 2004. 

In 2005, Pinkett Smith became one of many celebrities to invest a combined total of US $10 million in Carol’s Daughter, a line of beauty products created by Lisa Price. In 2015, the Smith couple were among the founding investors of an energy storage company.

Philanthropy 

In 1997, Pinkett Smith was the emcee of the Million Woman March in Philadelphia. Jada has created the Will and Jada Smith Family Foundation in Baltimore, Maryland, a charity that focuses on youth in urban inner cities and family support together with the help of Will Smith.

‘The Will and Jada Smith Family Foundation’ have provided grants to non-profit organizations such as YouthBuild, and Jada Smith has made personal donations to organizations. In 2006, Jada Smith donated $1 million to her high school alma mater, the Baltimore School for the Arts, and dedicated the new theater to her classmate and close friend Tupac Shakur. 

In 2012, on behalf of PETA, Jada wrote a letter to Baltimore’s mayor, asking that the visiting Ringling Brothers Circus. In 2013, she appeared in a video clip for Gucci’s “Chime for Change” campaign that aims to raise funds and awareness of women’s issues globally. 

Jada Smith’s personal life 

In the 1990s, Jada dated the former basketball player Grant Hill. Jada has a close friendship with rapper Tupac Shakur which was formed when they both attended the Baltimore School for the Arts. 

In 1995, she contributed $100,000 towards Shakur’s bail as he awaited an appeal on his sexual abuse conviction. Pinkett Smith stated in the 2003 documentary ‘Tupac: Resurrection’ that he was “one of my best friends. He was like a brother.” 

She met Will Smith in 1994 on the set of Smith’s television show ‘The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’ when she auditioned for the role of his character’s girlfriend. Will and Jada later began dating after he separated from Sheree Fletcher. On December 31, 1997, while Jada was three months pregnant, about 100 guests attended their wedding. 

In 2018, Jada said that she had been diagnosed with the autoimmune disease alopecia areata. Despite having medical tests, she said she could not find the cause of her alopecia and suspects it might be stress. 

In June 2020, singer and rapper August Alsina—a friend of Jada’s son Jaden—said that he and Jada had been involved in an adulterous affair in 2016 when he was 23 years old and she was 44, which Jada denied eventually. 

In 2021, Will Smith stated that Jada Pinkett Smith “never believed in conventional marriage” and that both had sexual relationships outside their marriage.

Awards won by Jada Pinkett Smith 

● NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Literary work- Children’s and Outstanding Actress in a Drama series. 

● MTV Movie and TV Awards for MTV Trailblazer. 

● NAACP Image Awards for Outstanding Host in a Talk 

● Daytime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Information Talk Show Host. 

Jada Smith’s Net Worth Growth 

Frequently Asked Questions

Why was Jada Pinkett forced to marry Will Smith? 

● Jada confessed that she didn’t want to marry Will, but her mother pressured Jada into tying the knot after she became pregnant with their child. 

Did Jada love Tupac? ● Despite always being very open about her love for the late rapper, Pinkett Smith has maintained that they were never more than highly close friends.