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“The role was so different from me that I had to adjust every aspect of myself to play it,” he says. Smith spent 18 weeks working with dialect and acting coaches. “The soundman practically jumped out of his seat as his ears were being blown off.” “Early on in the filming, Will walked onto the set and let out this loud scream, which is the way he warms up on his show,” Channing remembers. Smith’s boundless energy did sometimes cause commotion, though. “But what impressed me was that when he met with John (Guare), he immediately asked: ‘So, how does this character speak? How does he move?’ He never tried to manipulate the character to suit his own needs.” “Will pulls off a very demanding role with enormous sensitivity and aplomb,” Channing says. “He did this with such incredible confidence and charm that the very act of his trying to convince me of his abilities did exactly that.”Īnd the novice film actor gained the respect of his co-stars. “Will showed up for our meeting (at the Polo Lounge) in a three-piece suit and did a number on me, as they say,” recalls “Six Degrees” director Fred Schepisi from his home in Melbourne, Australia. He is sitting down to a lunch only a growing boy could finish consisting of chicken, corn, mashed potatoes and gravy, juice and topped off with the aforementioned yogurt.įollowing supporting roles in “Made in America” and “Where the Day Takes You,” Smith was determined to land a starring role in “Six Degrees.” “This is really good,” he exclaims, stirring his chocolate/vanilla frozen yogurt. Yet this walking entertainment conglomerate comes off as a well-mannered, eager kid. Meanwhile, in 1990, Smith landed the lead role in “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air.” Now in its forth season, the show remains high in the Nielsens.
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Last year, they were honored at the NAACP Image Awards as outstanding rap artists and, in October the duo released their fifth album, “Code Red.” They won a second Grammy for “Summertime,” from their fourth album. Their next album, “He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper,” spawned the mega-hit single “Parents Just Don’t Understand” and won the duo a 1988 Grammy Award for best rap performance. Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince and released the pop-rap single “Girls Ain’t Nothing but Trouble,” which became an international hit from their debut album, “Rock the House,” on their label JIVE. The West Philadelphia native began rapping at parties at 12 and, in 1986, began collaborating with musician Jeff Townes. Smith’s career is a testament to the sort of boundless enthusiasm and undeniable charm that would make Horatio Alger cringe. So I was concerned about how my credibility would be affected.” The origins of the music are about masculinity, how tough you can be. “You don’t see too many rappers playing homosexual roles in films. “My big concern was for my rap career,” he admits. He does admit some fears over how fans might perceive the radical image departure.
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“He tried to hint to me, but I wasn’t experienced enough as an actor to understand, that when you really delve into a role, you may feel like you’re letting go, but you can’t leave it at the studio.” And in fact, he held on to much of his yuppie persona each day after filming. “ ‘Six Degrees’ was the scariest choice that I’ve ever had to make in my career.”īefore accepting the role, he consulted Poitier, who gave his blessing. “If you lined up a hundred films, this would be the last one that people would expect me to do,” he admits while eating lunch in his “Fresh Prince” dressing room at NBC. In the film, based on the hit play by John Guare, he portrays a gay con artist who talks his way into the home of a New York society couple (Stockard Channing and Donald Sutherland) by sporting a Harvard blazer and a privileged lockjaw, claiming to be the son of Sidney Poitier.īut the streetwise teen idol has lost neither his marbles nor his flair for self-promotion. It may be the most audacious example of Hollywood casting against type since Donna Reed played a hooker in “From Here to Eternity.” But when the film version of “Six Degrees of Separation” opens in Los Angeles on Friday, audiences will see 25-year-old Will Smith, the Grammy Award-winning rapper who parlayed his hipster persona into a television rating bonanza as “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air,” in a dramatically different role.