Growing Up Smith!
Red Table Talk- 1,318 views
- 30 Jul 2020
Jaden Smith and Willow Smith reveal what it's like growing up in one of the most famous families in America. Adrienne Banfield Norris (Gammy) wonders if the kids may have been granted too much independence by their parents Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith.
Hi, I'm Devon Larry, and I'm Carolina Barlowe, and we're here to tell you to dump him, break up with your boyfriend, and we want you to listen to our podcast, True Romance every week where we talk about our love lives and the love lives of others. Please join our exes who we know will also be listening, like Kyle. Kyle, are you there? Hey, babe, how's life? No, you look good, though.
Me? Oh, my God. Stop, please. I haven't even gotten a haircut in like three months, OK. Please help us pay for Carolina psychiatrist bills by listening on the Hurt radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
I want to. Hi, I'm Caitlin Durante, and I'm Jamie Loftus, and we're the host of the Bechtol Cast on I Heart Radio. Each episode we invite comedians, writers and film critics to bring their favorite movie and analyze it and sometimes tear it to shreds using an intersectional feminist lens and the back door test as a jumping off point for discussion.
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Can you do me a favor and see what the status of the children are? Oh, the kids are running behind schedule.
So, Jen, how would you like to handle. Welcome to the service.
How late are they going to be for four. Thirty eight.
OK, Willow just texted me. Well, you know they're working well that's a good thing. Her and Jane, I'm rehearsing for the Job Starts tour tomorrow. All right. We're going to be talking about parenting, the joys of parenthood and the pitfalls of parenting.
OK, so Willow GAM, what's it like?
What's happening like all these gold chains I got yesterday, where did you get that from all twenty five dollars. Going to be careful for people thinking you got real crap on JD.
My baby boy, my first born was everybody.
My name is Dennis. You know, he's one of the most loving, gentle creatures that I know. I just want to say thank you for being the best mom in the world. Jason's a musician, an actor and an entrepreneur. He has a clothing line.
We kind of believe that you need to be able to show your individuality with your clothing and how you feel about life, his own record label and a sustainably sourced springwater company because he cares about making the world a better place. I'm a proud mama when it comes to Jaden and Willow of their successes and their compassion. Willow and Jaden are extremely talented and extremely opinionated.
They are unique individuals, to say the least. But they get that honestly because they come from two unique parents.
My kids grew up much differently than Wil and I did, and I'm so curious to hear their thoughts on our parent. All right.
You guys were at the red table again, Jane, and thank you for being here. You're a special guest today. I'm so glad to be especially to have some male energy in his. I'm glad to be here. Just in from Japan, we're so glad that you're here.
Yes, exactly.
Yeah, I just want to talk a little bit about the difference between how your mom raised you and how I raised your mom.
We didn't give kids a whole lot of choice.
Am I right in that? You're very right. And, you know, I felt like you guys had too much say over your own lives.
You know, and if I told you something because I said so, yeah, I know you are. Why?
Because I said so, but. And your mom and dad had to really kind of break me out of that because she treated you like adults, adults. And I just felt like. He's eight. Yeah, he's going to tell me what time is. Yup, it was their idea of parenting was so different from what I was used to, I was like these people crazy.
Yeah, that is so I remember hearing you in the world game, you in the world.
Well, I remember always being like, well, once again, becomes is going to be a different story. Yeah. Once again becomes who you have to be like. But I think having both worlds was good.
It was great because it was a balance.
And Supernus school words we love so far so good. But like that they got their therapy fun. Exactly.
I don't want to make decisions for you. I want to prepare you as quick as possible and start to give you as much power over your life as quickly as I can. True.
I think, too, that I have a sense of ownership over your mom that she doesn't have over you guys like she belonged to me and they don't know.
But I feel like I would. Yeah. You know, and that that's not.
But I think they belong to them.
So a lot of mothers that because of their that anxiety of no, you're my baby, I know what's best.
You're going to make the wrong decisions because you're immature, you're a child. Why that feeling just like encompasses their child and then their child just becomes not able to make their own decisions. You know what I'm saying? No.
What I realized the other day, I had a huge epiphany about being a parent to you guys.
There is an aspect of your life that is completely strange and unknown to me, and that is growing up in this with parents that have the amount of privilege that the amount of access.
What was it like being raised in this very unconventional lifestyle?
You're not a normal human if you can't go out into the world.
And I know there's some things that you absolutely just have to experience for yourself totally. And it's like, I don't know how things always work. I always get nervous at the end of dinner because it's like, how do you have dinner with a group of people? Because when I have dinner with my dad, he orders everything on the menu. He pays for everything and he leaves. So it's like, is that how we do it? Everybody expects me to do that.
You know, if I go to dinner with Mommy, it's like, OK, we're not going to order everything on the menu, but she's going to pay for everything for all of her friends, including us. So it's like, what do I do when it's just me and my homies and we're just chilling for dinner? Do I wait to see what someone else does? Do I ask for the check and then just not do anything? Do I just pay for everything?
And you will expect that from me? I literally hate Disneyland because I had one terrible experience and everyone expects me to pay for them. And they're like, hey, let's go to Disneyland.
I was like, yeah, let's go. And I was super young. It was an older girls. And I was like, yeah. And they were all like behind my back, like, oh, she's going to pay for everything. And I, you know what I'm saying? It's like, oh yeah. Like like I honestly wasn't thinking that way. So when we got there it was like so yeah, I want a funnel cake and this and that.
We're going to go on Space Mountain and you got your cash and I'm like, oh yeah, obviously. And they're like, oh great. You put it down. And I'm just like, I didn't I didn't think it was going to be like this. It was painful. Yeah.
We have to go out into the real world to really experience that. And, you know, I'm a target. And that's really hard to you have to be aware of that as well, you know, and then it's like, OK, cool. This is why my parents have been protecting me from this, why I can't go and do this, or that's why I never was allowed to do this when I was young.
One thing that I've learned, though, is that every child needs something different. Yeah. At fifteen years old, Jaden and I remember this day specifically, it was probably one of the most heartbreaking moments of of my life. You got to a point where you told me straight up you were like, Mom, I have to leave here.
To live my life totally, and I remember thinking to myself, as devastated as I was.
I was like, he's right. Yeah, the time is now, he's 15. It's time for him to leave the house and I would have never agreed with that.
I knew I told Will when Jaden was smaller. I said we'd be lucky to keep him in the house till he's 16 because he was so mature.
He was making films.
He really he could really manage his own life, his own life. Like being in this lifestyle, in this world is a bubble.
Yeah. And he wanted out and I understood that because I didn't have the bubble right.
And I didn't know I knew what having my freedom outside of the bubble, what I gained from that. And I knew that the sooner I let him go, the faster he was going to come back and just makes you appreciate, you know, being at home, being with your parents, spending quality time with family.
You get out into the world and then you kind of just kind of understand things. That's true.
I want to make sure people understand our background. My father was a physician. He was an anesthesiologist, and my mother was a social worker.
And we were very they were the quintessential black middle class, you know, gave me had me at your age, No.
One. I was really young and clueless.
Let's just be clear on that. I was 18 years old and I was ill prepared for the responsibilities of parenting. And not only was I young, but I became addicted to drugs. Right. And, you know, I was a functioning addict, but I was an addict just the same. So, you know, I was consumed with working to support you, but also to support a habit, which is why I had so much freedom.
You and Daddy never told us really what type of world you guys came from. Yeah, we just thought that you guys just brought it up out of the ground, you know what I'm saying?
And I'm now outside of the bubble. I go out and I meet random person on the street telling me, yeah, man, I worked with your dad back in these days telling me about my family. I never knew my life.
I mean, it's real. Yeah, I have once. All the time. But you definitely have.
But they didn't hear from us. Yeah.
I had to hustle. That's what my life was about because there was a certain kind of lifestyle and way I wanted to live.
And she needed a mother to provide security. I couldn't afford it.
I never wanted to depend on a man to take care of me.
So I was in the streets selling drugs, doing all kinds of stuff.
I couldn't even imagine that.
Then in my own neighborhood, we were in the midst of a lot of violence that was just the norm. The fact that I had to live and die by my own hands, who prepared me to be out here in L.A. at 18 by myself and it being nothing, I was like these jokers out here that they think is really doing something, really run a game on somebody you ain't running game on nobody.
OK, I dealt with Chili's homie. You produced what you asked me to do. What?
We had a very different lifestyle than you guys. And even your father grew up in a household that was a lot of abuse. Your father worked in an ice house, he was building cement walls and helping to restore refrigerators and cooling systems, and you guys grew up thinking about survival.
You can only think about food and water and shelter and safety. And that's the only thing that you were thinking about. You guys grew up as soldiers. Yeah, that meant out of the battle that decided to go and attack together and to conquer.
Yes, we did well in that were in constant conflict over Jane.
Hi, I'm Devon Leary. And I'm Carolina Barlowe. And we're here to tell you to dump him, break up with your boyfriend. And we want you to listen to our podcast, True Romance every week where we talk about our love lives and the love lives of others. Please join our exes who we know will also be listening, like Kyle. Kyle, are you there? Hey, babe, how's life? No, you look good, though.
Me? Oh, my God. Stop, please. I haven't even gotten a haircut in like three months, OK. Please help us pay for Carolina psychiatrist bills by listening on the Hurt radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
I want to. Hi, I'm Holly Fry.
And I'm Tracy Wilson, and together we host a show called Stuff You Missed in History Class, as the name suggests, we talk about some things that maybe either you didn't remember from history class or they weren't covered at all. There have always been women in history. There have always been black people and other people of color. There have always been people all over the LGBTQ spectrum as a part of the historical record. Tracy, we've had some really interesting episodes recently.
What's one of your favorites? The history of beekeeping, which we had to abridge, because that's very involved. How about you?
I really, really enjoyed researching our episode on Seneca Village, which was a settlement in what became Central Park that was mostly populated by black people who actually owned the property there. And unfortunately, their time there was kind of a race. So if this kind of material sounds good to you, come listen to the show. We have new episodes on Mondays and Wednesdays and then a behind the scenes Minnesota on Friday and bonus classic episode from the archive on Saturday.
You can find us on the I Heart radio app and Apple podcast or wherever it is you listen.
Where do you think you've got your confidence from, because I'm somebody that even to this day like, I'm surprised that I'm even sitting here, my self-esteem and my self-confidence is pretty low.
I would say is pretty low.
I think you've come a long way. I have. I have come a long way.
I have to believe when you put them on the brand and off and on the ground, you are the thing that I appreciate so much about you guys. The level of self-confidence that you have to be comfortable in your own skin is amazing to me. And for me, that's the best gift that your mom and dad gave you.
Yeah, right.
For me to think that I could ever go into the world and tell anybody else how they should raise their children.
I've learned that's an absolute no no.
But I feel like people should have the freedom to look at their kids and decide for themselves what their children need versus what the school system might tell you to go by your own instinct.
And it doesn't necessarily have to look like what anybody else is doing.
The short amount of time I think that I went to preschool, I felt like if I imagine that I feel like it was like three years into this pre-school, one day a week, it might have got to I think maybe two weeks felt like three years, let me tell you. And I had to sit in the parking lot every day.
I could not leave. And he would look at me with his little backpack and he says, people don't care about me. Why would you leave me with people who don't love me? And so then I said, Jayden, how about this? You're not being left with people who don't love you because Mommy's is going to be sitting in the parking lot.
So that was the agreement that mommy set in the parking lot, because then sometimes she would sneak away, get things and come back.
And I'd be like, you didn't have this or you have a different car? No, real.
I came back home from school. I was always in a terrible mood. My whole days were just filled with insecurity and fear and and bad PB and JS.
But, you know, I started homeschooling you guys, too, because I wanted you to have an opportunity to be with your dad and to be with me. When I was working, there was no way I was leaving you home. You know, ever you always had to be with me. It was great. Yeah. It was really a very interesting time for me as a parent because I don't always know exactly.
What to say all the time, because what motivates you and what's important is completely different than what was in my engine exactly for you is like everything's good. Yeah, to a certain extent. And then if it's not, I still don't understand the part that's not good for the world, though.
Like, that's where we're at.
Right. It's like this is good, but everything else isn't. Three point four million people dying from not having enough water every year and nine point eight billion tons of plastic on there since nineteen thirty five. Right.
That's where we do relate in regards to we want to help make the world a better place. But I'm talking about as far as your personal motivation.
Yeah. You know, so it's completely different for us because we already know that based off of what was done in the past generation with you, with Daddy, it's like you guys paved the way for generations to come. So it's like, thank you.
What is the part that you think Daddy and I have a difficult time connecting to you with?
I mean, I only have one, like, really terrible experience, which is which is with my hair. Your feeling about that was that you felt like you were put in the game too soon, just that the values of the people around me should have been the opposite.
You and Daddy should have been OK.
We value her musical growth and knowledge more than her popularity. Not so much about just a hit record.
Yeah, exactly. I understand that. And I think all of that came with it. And that was too much. Let me tell you something. When we heard it, I was like, what is this? Yeah, it was Jay. Jay Z was like, this is a hit record.
And he looked at James like really he was this he was right.
But also for us, that survival mentality for your dad and I, we were like, oh, man, should be set up for life. Yeah.
This is her start with having that mindset of survival. And then you have a child will know somebody else's survival. What happens if we lose everything? Yeah, because you blow all of our money. What happens to our child? Make them a freaking workaholic.
Soldiers always take care.
Always divide real time. Let me ask you a question. The upset that came with that, did you shaving your head have anything to do with that? Had everything to do with it. So so there's a Nirvana lyric that says, I shaved my head and then I'm not sad. And all this time, I thought you wanted to shave your head because my hair was short like that. So what was the reason? Did you think it was going to make you happy?
Did you think it was a symbol of freedom? Wasn't rebellion? It was honestly all of that.
You had a hit single out and you were like, this sucks. I don't like this lifestyle. And guess what? To put a big middle finger up to everybody, including my parents, I'm freakin shaving my head because Kurt Cobain said so just because I'm done.
It's not what I want.
When I realized even as a parent and this goes back to you, Mom, this goes back to you. OK, Mom. I hate when I get home, you know, because you know what, I think parents have to give themselves much more forgiveness.
When you become a parent, you have these huge ideals even for yourself, because we all are coming into parenting with our own childhood traumas.
And you're hoping that you can fix all that through your own rearing of your children.
And you can't your kids are going to have their burdens. And even though I see how it might have hurt you, it's what I knew.
Yeah.
Hey, Kaitlin Durante. Yeah. Jamie Loftus.
Don't you wish there were a podcast that examined some of everyone's favorite movies using an intersectional feminist lens? Well, yes, I do. Well, good news. It exists. And it's our podcast. What? How did I not know? I know the Bacto cast is a weekly show where we invite our favorite comics, writers and film critics to bring one of their favorite movies and tear it to shreds with us using the Bechdel test as a jumping off point for discussion.
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Hey, this whole pass the final test. Well, except for Indiana Jones. Wow. He ruined everything.
I'm John Horn, host of the podcast Hollywood, the sequel. On every episode, we're challenging producers, actors and directors to tell us what's broken in Hollywood and how they fix it. Here's producer Ava DuVernay on ending systemic racism.
It's just not enough a statement. It's not enough. One black executive. It's not enough to it's not enough. Your company must look like the real world.
And we're tackling other problems, like keeping everybody safe on set and fixing Hollywood's broken gig economy. Here's my line producer, Jason Reid. The financial pressure to do less with more in terms of days running a of 12 to 14 hours, six days a week wasn't a sustainable model before, and it's definitely not a sustainable model. Now, listen to Hollywood, the sequel on the I Heart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. I remember will call me, and he was like, have you talked about this with Jaden and him wearing a skirt that's like, you know.
You had your moment of rebellion, I went to the same thing that Willow went through with with with my hair, with chronic, it was happening at the same time.
I remember being on set with Will, and it was such a struggle between he and I in regards to Jaden. And I understand why men take their sons away for, like, whatever kind of warrior training, because it is completely, utterly unfair and unnatural for a woman to have to sit and watch anything like that for her son and women that were in constant conflict. I mean, to the point that we were warring over, Jane, your work ethic was off the chain.
You all happened in this room. Yeah. Yeah. The the poster was shot in this room.
His show was it was right in this spot.
Right. And that's what's weird. And I remember I remember the moment because I asked you you went down into that full split and he was in tears. And I was like, I'm done. And he looked at me like. Mom, I'm good, dad.
He got up and he said, let's do it again, even in those battles that we've had over what's too much, what's too little trying to find the balance in regards to parenting. I'll tell you one thing about the two of y'all.
Y'all know how to work. Y'all work hard and you'll do it well.
And I'm proud of that. I give Jaden props, Jaden, the Louis Vuitton, and I mean, you decided to wear a skirt. I got an offer to be signed to Louis Vuitton Women's. Yeah, but Jaden is because you were wearing skirts.
Yeah. You got the idea to sign you to Louis Vuitton women. Do you understand, like being a black.
Young man and the son of like an uber masculine showing aliens just, you know, like, yeah, it is like love that first or I remember will call me.
And he was like, have you talked about this with with Jason and him wearing a skirt.
Looks like you have. Yeah, not only that, he's pretty happy about it. He's going to say anything else.
Yeah, you talked about wanting to wear skirts to give kids the freedom, to give other people the freedom to think out of the box for themselves and not to feel like in doing that, that they would be bullied or be attacked the way that comes along with it.
Got it. But it's like I wore the skirt so I could fly. Yeah. Yeah. You know, I'm saying I don't think that that's why I wore the skirt so that everybody would say she's an innovator, is heads in a different place. So here we have some questions from our Facebook watcher, gay guy.
You've got questions from real people, Batuz. Go ahead.
Take, take. Take one, right, take one. Well, I have an easy one, so you guys keep picking and this one says, how do you feel about Will's Instagram?
I'm not putting you in my Instagram. This is just mine. It's like if you want to be on mine.
I mean, I'm just saying I wouldn't like to put you in it and then use you on my Instagram.
That's cheap. Awesome. He's having a blast doing it and I'm having a blast watching it. It's hilarious. What's one rule you're proud of breaking every damn rule there is? Yeah.
Is it OK for parents to track their kids remotely? I see. Yes, I said yes, actually. I was just thinking about this for safety reasons. All of the cars, including mine, need to have trackers in them done.
They actually asked for is punishment a necessary part of parenting? OK. For me. Disappointment as punishment. Mhm, yeah, I respect my parents so much that disappointment is like a knife in my heart. I want to be a person that my parents want to look at that my parents are proud of.
Yeah.
That's it, we're done, awesome, whoof, family, friends, gratitude, gratitude, thank you for being our our guest yesterday about having jaded to be you guys Ainsley's. So we suppose when you're doing that, are you talking to the Facebook family or you, that's just another camera.
My first sexual experience was amazing. I wouldn't say amazing. Like on an extra tabletop.
We are talking about sex. Oh, I knew the night Jane and lost his virginity.
Did you know my introduction to sex was obviously weighing in on you and daddy? Until the next step is to do a selfie of. Three female. To join the red table, talk family and become a part of the conversation, follow us at Facebook dot com slash red tabletop.
Thanks for listening to this episode of Red Tablecloth podcast produced by Facebook Watch Westbrooke Audio and I heart radio.
I'm John Horn, host of the podcast Hollywood, the sequel. On every episode, we're challenging producers, actors and directors to tell us what's broken in Hollywood and how they'd fix it. Here's producer Ava DuVernay on ending systemic racism.
It's just not enough of a statement. It's not enough. One black executive is not enough to is not enough. Your company must look like the real world.
And we're tackling other problems, like keeping everybody safe on set and fixing Hollywood's broken gig economy. Here's Moolarben producer Jason Reid. The financial pressure to do less with more in terms of days running a crew 12 to 14 hours, six days a week wasn't a sustainable model before, and it's definitely not a sustainable model. Now, listen to Hollywood, the sequel on the I Heart radio app, Apple podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. Hi, I'm Devon Leary, and I'm Carolina Barlowe, and we're here to tell you to dump him, break up with your boyfriend, and we want you to listen to our podcast, True Romance every week where we talk about our love lives and the love lives of others.
Please join our exes who we know will also be listening, like Kyle. Kyle, are you there? Hey, babe, how's life? No, you look good, though. Me? Oh, my God. Stop, please. I haven't even gotten a haircut in like three months, OK. Please help us pay for Carolina psychiatrist bills by listening on the radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you listen to podcasts.
I want to.