September 25, 2008. Copyright 2008, Graphic News. All rights reserved

Will Smith, rap star millionaire turned Hollywood high-flyer, is 40
By Susan Shepherd

LONDON, September 25, Graphic News:  Four years ago Will Smith lent his voice to a Dreamworks animation -- Shark Tale -- in which his character was a low-paid little fish who could only dream of life at the top of the reef. Today, Smith is listed by Forbes magazine as the highest paid actor in Hollywood with earnings said to be $80 million in the last year alone. But like Oscar the Shark Slayer, who found out in the end that it takes more than money to make you truly happy, the Philadelphia-born charmer, whose nickname at school was ÒPrinceÓ, is wary of the lure of great wealth and extravagant status symbols. ÒToo many people spend money they havenÕt earned, to buy things they don't want, to impress people they don't likeÓ, he observes. 
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One of four children, brought up in a Baptist family, SmithÕs first love was music. By the age of 12 he was developing his skills as a rapper and, at 16, began a lucrative musical partnership with Jeff Townes, otherwise known as DJ Jazzy Jeff. The pairÕs debut rap album, Rock The House, made Smith his first million when he was just 18, although he lost much of that early fortune to the Inland Revenue after neglecting to pay tax. Using the stage name Fresh Prince, SmithÕs brand of rap was a world away from the menacing street music of a more violent youth culture. And it was this genial personality, along with SmithÕs handsome, clean-cut looks, which made him ideal material for a new TV sitcom set in the affluent Beverley Hills area of Los Angeles. Smith quickly became known to television audiences across America as the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air.

His natural, light touch won him a role alongside Whoopi Goldberg and Ted Danson in the hit movie Made In America (1993), but a more complex talent was revealed later that year in Six Degrees of Separation, where Smith played a young man pretending to be the son of Sidney Poitier. In the Bad Boys films (1995, 2003) he was the smooth cop and in Men in Black -- both the original and its sequel -- fought aliens alongside Tommy Lee Jones. One of his most acclaimed performances to date came in Ali (2001) where his portrayal of world champion boxer Muhammad Ali won Smith his first Oscar nomination. The second came in 2006 with The Pursuit of Happyness, a moving, rags-to-riches story in which SmithÕs second child, Jaden, played his on-screen son. Keeping up the family tradition, his young daughter Willow appeared alongside her dad in I am Legend (2007), a powerful tale of isolation in a futuristic New York, where a virus has wiped out the population.
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With the release this year of Hancock, about a vigilante with superhuman powers, Smith set a new box office high: his last eight films have all grossed more than $100 million. No other actor in the history of cinema has achieved such a financial track record.
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