Jada Pinkett Smith - Family and Early Life

Family and Early Life

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, Jada Koren Pinkett was named after her mother's favorite soap opera actress, Jada Rowland. Pinkett-Smith is of West Indian, Creole, and Portuguese-Jewish ancestry. Her parents are Adrienne Banfield-Jones, the head nurse of an inner-city clinic in Baltimore, and Robsol Pinkett Jr., who ran a construction company. Banfield-Jones became pregnant in high school; the couple married but divorced after several months. Banfield-Jones raised Pinkett with the help of her mother, Marion Martin Banfield, who was employed as a social worker. Banfield noticed her granddaughter's passion for the performing arts and enrolled her in piano, tap dance, and ballet lessons. She has a younger half-brother, actor/writer Caleeb Pinkett.

" understood what I wanted and never stood in my way."

Pinkett Smith has remained close to her mother and said, "A mother and daughter's relationship is usually the most honest, and we are so close." She participated as the maid of honor in Banfield-Jones' 1998 wedding to telecommunications executive Paul Jones. Pinkett-Smith has shown great admiration for her grandmother, saying, "My grandmother was a doer who wanted to create a better community and add beauty to the world."

Pinkett Smith majored in dance and theatre at the Baltimore School for the Arts, graduating in 1989. She continued her education at the North Carolina School of the Arts, but dropped out after a year. She moved to Los Angeles, California to pursue an acting career.