From The Fresh Prince to Hollywood Best: Happy Birthday Will Smith

Who would’ve thought that the same guy from West Philadelphia, born and raised, on the playground was where he spent most of his days at, with the funny and happy raps, on a television sitcom with the illest hip hop gear I have ever seen, side by side with a DJ who goes by the name of DJ Jazzy Jeff, would be one of Hollywood’s most respected actors and married to the beautiful and lovely Jada Pinkett. That man would be known as Will Smith aka The Fresh Prince. When it comes to hip hop fashion, Will have always been an inspiration to me. Besides LL Cool J, Slick Rick, Run-DMC, and Big Daddy Kane, Will was also someone I looked up to fashionably. He literally would wear something that nobody else would or do something else with his clothes that nobody else would do either and that to me was dope. I take fashion lessons from this man. Now the music, that was dope too. As the album titles says “He’s the DJ, I’m the Rapper”, Will and Jazz were the perfect hip hop duo. Songs like “Brand New Funk”, “You Saw My Blinker”, “Girls Ain’t Nothing But Trouble”, “Parents Just Don’t Understand”, and the ultimate Fresh Prince and Jazzy Jeff classic “Summertime”, these guys are definitely one of the greatest hip hop duos of all time. Now the transition that Will went from the Fresh Prince to Hollywood actor Will Smith was a weird one to me. Throughout the last couple of seasons of “The Fresh Prince of Bel Air”, Will’s style changed drastically. He went from hip hop gear in Doc Martens and Jordans, hat to the back, one sneaker white, one sneaker black, to plain shirt and jeans but still had the Jordans on. Towards the late 90’s all the way til now, Will Smith has been non stop coming out with movies back to back. My top favorites are “Hitch”, “Bad Boys II”, “The Pursuit of Happyness”, and more. I strongly disliked “Ali” though. I didn’t think he was the right person to play Muhammad Ali. It was more like Will Smith a boxer kinda movie, I didn’t get the Ali vibe from it. Wild Wild West was bad too. Just couldn’t get with it and I remember when that movie came out too. I can’t forget about how different his music became too but it was still good. DJ Jazzy Jeff was no longer beside him, and he had joints like “Gettin’ Jiggy Wit It” and “Men In Black” with Coko from SWV singing on the hook and chorus. From Fresh Prince to Hollywood big time, Will Smith is definitely one of hip hop’s greatest artists and Hollywood’s greatest actors on the big screen. Definitely an inspiration to me.