Will Smith Reveals His Father was Physically Abusive in New Memoir
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Will Smith, in his upcoming memoir Will, reveals that his father was physically abusive.
Smith opened up about his childhood during a recent profile for GQ, which included passages from the memoir that reveal the violence he experienced for the first time.
Interviewing Smith, Wesley Lowery first highlighted his upcoming role as Richard Williams, the father of tennis all-stars Venus and Serena Williams, in King Richard.
Serena was so impressed with Smith’s portrayal of her father that she told Lowery that “there were moments she had to remind herself that it wasn’t actually her father on the screen.”
Smith explained to Lowery that Richard Williams was similar to his own father, adding, “So when I first read [the script], I understood what it’s like to want your kids to succeed.”
The actor expanded on his relationship with his father later in the profile, opening up for the first time about the day he watched his father punch his mother in the side of the head.
In his memoir, Smith writes that the moment “has defined who I am today,” adding, “He was one of the greatest blessings of my life, and also one of my greatest sources of pain.”
“His brother jumped up, trying to intervene. His sister fled, hiding in her bedroom. Smith remembers freezing, too scared to do anything,” Lowery wrote of the violent incident. “Smith never discussed the violence with his father, who championed his son’s career until he died in 2016.”
Smith revealed that he would not have been able to reveal “his stuff about my father beating up my mother,” had his father not passed away, adding, “I never would’ve been able to talk about that while he was alive.”
Smith additionally shared that he spoke to his mother about the abuse for the first time while meeting with her to discuss the memoir.
“It was literally the first time we ever discussed [it],” Smith told Lowery. “She had never heard my perception of what happened. So it was really cathartic in a way. It went great. But it was a brutal couple of weeks, man. It was brutal.”
