Inside Will Smith’s relationship history: How movie superstar married and dated a string of Hollywood leading ladies and was linked with many more before settling down with Jada in 1997

Hollywood titan Will Smith’s relationship with his wife Jada Pinkett Smith is fraught, to say the least.

The ups and downs of their 25-year marriage have always fascinated the public, and much has been revealed in recent years, with news story after news story showing the world more about the complicated and often difficult partnership the couple finds themselves in. than they might like.

Their relationship was most famous last year, when Will Smith punched comedian Chris Rock after he made a joke about Jada’s short hair at the 94th Academy Awards, coupled with the now infamous line: “Keep my wife’s name out of your * ** mouth!’

Smith received a lot of backlash for the slap, and Jada admitted she was surprised to hear him call her his wife.

“We haven’t called each other husband and wife in a long time,” she told Hoda Kotb in an interview.

Will’s relationships have been dragged into the spotlight again after someone claiming to be his former assistant said he caught Smith and his longtime friend and fellow Fresh Prince actor Duane Martin having sex in a dressing room.

Brother Bilaal, who describes himself as the actor’s ex-personal assistant, said in a now viral interview: ‘I opened the door of Duane’s dressing room and that’s when I saw Duane having anal sex with Will.

“There was a couch and Will was bent over on the couch and Duane got up and killed him, killed him – it was murder in there.”

Will Smith has denied the rumors, claiming they are ‘unequivocally false’, with a source claiming the King Richard actor is considering taking legal action against Brother Bilaal.

MailOnline has rounded up all of Will Smith’s public relationships before his marriage to Jada Pinkett Smith.

Sandra Denton, late eighties

In a bizarre twist, it was revealed that Will Smith and Sandra Denton, also known as Pepa in the hip-hop duo Salt-N-Pepa, dated in the late 1980s.

The revelation came in an episode of his music podcast Class of ’88. Denton looked at Will doubtfully after he reminded her that the pair were on a date.

He quickly said, “We can talk about it! We have grown up! We don’t do anything.’

Sheree Zampino, 1991 – 1995

Sheree Zampino was Will Smith’s first wife. The couple was together from 1991 to 1995, married in 1992 and had a son together, Trey, that same year.

The relationship was reportedly difficult and they divorced in 1995. Will Smith once admitted that their divorce was one of the most difficult moments of his life.

Despite this, the couple remains close. In 2018, Will Smith called her “the best baby mama ever” in an Instagram post in honor of her birthday.

The pair even posed with his Best Actor Oscar after the 94th Academy Awards, during which he punched comedian Chris Rock for making a joke about Jada Pinkett Smith.

While Will’s career and fame skyrocketed after they broke up. Sheree didn’t quite follow the same trajectory. She appeared on all three seasons of VH1’s “Hollywood Exes,” a reality TV show that documented the lives of women who dated famous people.

Her castmates include Nicole Murphy, the ex-wife of Eddie Murphy, and Andrea Kelly, the ex-wife of R. Kelly.

Garcelle Beauvais, early 1990s

In 2020, Haitian-American actress Garcelle Beauvais revealed on an episode of The Real Housewives of Beverly Hill that she and Smith had dated in the early 1990s.

The couple met on the set of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air. She admitted in a 2022 interview that they were not in a “long-term relationship.”

‘I was resourceful, he as a single and TV star, so we went out a few times.’

She revealed that they dated while he was married to Sheree, saying she only found out when she called him at an awkward time while he was with Sheree and their son Trey.

“I remember calling him one day and he was in the car. And his son, with Sheree, were in the back.

“You know, he picked up the car, or Bluetooth or whatever it was at the time, or the speaker – whatever it was – and he said, ‘Hey, how are you?’ And I said, “I’m great.”

“And I heard a little voice in the background say, ‘Is that Miss Jada?’

‘And then I thought, “Okay, I’m not the only one.” Exit stage left.

“If a child knows someone, that person is a little more important, right?!”

Tyra Banks, 1993 – 1994

Will Smith dated supermodel Tyra Banks between 1993 and 1994, after meeting when she auditioned for The Fresh Prince of Bel Air, in what would become her first TV acting gig.

She managed to land the role and played his ex-girlfriend Jackie from Philadelphia for eight episodes in season four.

Although they dated for a year, reports claimed that nothing ever “got serious” between them.

It is currently unknown what their relationship was like as Smith was married to Sheree Zampino at the time.

Banks’ career blossomed, appearing on the covers of GQ and the Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue, as well as editorials for Vogue, Elle, Vanity Fair and Harper’s Bazaar.

From 1997 to 2005, she was also a Victoria’s Secret Angel.

Karine Steffans, 2004

Karrine Steffans reportedly dated Will Smith in 2004 while he was still with his then-wife Sheree Zampino.

No exact timeline of their relationship exists, and while there are no official reports of the couple dating, she reportedly mentioned the relationship in her book “The Vixen Diaries.”

The now 45-year-old ran away from her home at the age of 16 and began working as an exotic dancer, after a long and difficult childhood in the US Virgin Islands and Florida.

Despite this, she became a New York Times bestselling author several times with her series of autobiographies.

It is unknown how their relationship worked, as Smith was already long married to Jada Pinkett Smith at the time.

Jada Pinkett Smith, 1995 – present

Will Smith and Jada Pinkett Smith began dating shortly after her divorce from then-husband Sheree Fletcher in 1995, having met a year earlier on the set of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air.

Although Will was initially interested in her, he took no action and instead dated Tyra Banks for a year.

The couple married in 1997 while Jada was pregnant. She later admitted that she “didn’t really want to get married” to Will Smith.

‘I was under so much pressure as a young actress. I just didn’t know what to do,” she said in a 2022 episode of her Red Table talk show.

‘I was so upset that I had to get married. I was so angry that I walked down the aisle crying. I cried all the way down the aisle,” she added.

Her mother, Adrienne Banfield-Norris, admitted the marriage was “terrible.”

‘It was a mess. Jada was ill, she was very unpleasant… She didn’t cooperate with anything.’

But the same couldn’t be said for Will, who said in the same episode, “There wasn’t a day in my life when I wanted to do anything other than get married and have a family.”

“From literally the age of 5, I imagined what my family would be like.”

Their marriage was rocky from the start, and became even rockier in 2013 when she led the world to believe the pair were in an open relationship, after telling an interviewer, “I always told Will, ‘You can do whatever you want. want. as long as you can look at yourself in the mirror and everything is going well.”

“Because at the end of the day, Will is his own man. I’m here as his partner, but he’s his own man.”

She later clarified the comments, saying in a social media post, “Open marriage? The statement I made regarding ‘Will can do whatever he wants’ has underscored the need to discuss the relationship between trust and love, and how they coexist.”

She revealed earlier this year that the couple had been separated since 2016 and were no longer living together, although they were still married.

She told NBC News at the time that she had promised herself that she and Will would never divorce, and that she did her best not to break that promise.

But in 2020 it was revealed that at the age of 44 she had an affair with 23-year-old rapper August Alsina, a friend of her son Jaden.

She initially denied the relationship, but later admitted she had an “entanglement” with him.