Will Smith

Will Smith (birthname: Willard Carroll Smith) had a long reign as the so-called “King of Summer” in the movie box office from 1995 (with Bad Boys’ $141.4 million return) to 2012 (with Men in Black 3’s return of $654.2 million), as well as being the first rap artist to make a complete transition to becoming one of the biggest movie stars of his generation. Smith’s feature was in the cast of co-writer/director Marc Rocco’s drama for New Line Cinema, Where the Day Takes You (1992), with Sean Astin, Lara Flynn Boyle, Balthazar Getty, Ricki Lake, James LeGros, and Dermot Mulroney.

Smith played opposite Whoopi Goldberg and Ted Danson in Warner Bros.’s $104-million-grossing comedy, Made in America (1993), with Nia Long, Jennifer Tilly, and Paul Rodriguez, under Richard Benjamin’s direction. Smith had his acting breakthrough in one of his most interesting roles in director Fred Schepisi’s big-screen adaptation for MGM of John Guare’s contemporary masterpiece, Six Degrees of Separation (1993), starring Stockard Channing, Donald Sutherland, Mary Beth Hurt, Bruce Davison, Ian McKellan.

Will Smith gained box-office royalty as Det. Mike Lowrey, opposite co-star Martin Lawrence, in Columbia/Sony Pictures Releasing’s blockbuster buddy cop movie, Bad Boys, with Téa Leoni, Tcheky Karyo, Theresa Randle, and Marg Helgenberger, under Michael Bay’s direction. Smith solidified his “King of Summer” status by leading the sprawling cast of 20^th Century Fox’s $817-million-grossing sci-fi epic, Independence Day (1996), directed and co-written (with producer Dean Devlin) by Roland Emmerich, with Bill Pullman, Jeff Goldblum, Mary McDonnell, Judd Hirsch, Randy Quaid, Vivica A. Fox, Robert Loggia, and Harvey Fierstein.

Smith continued his run of box-office smashes with Columbia/Sony’s franchise-launcher, Men in Black (1997), co-starring Tommy Lee Jones, and directed by Barry Sonnenfeld; Smith returned with co-star Jones and director Sonnenfeld in the sequel, Men in Black II (2002); and then Smith completed the series with Smith and director Sonnenfeld (and added co-star Josh Brolin) in Men in Black 3 (2012), with the three movies returning a total gross of nearly $1.7 billion.

Will Smith then starred in Enemy of the State (1998), director Tony Scott’s stylish political thriller for Touchstone Pictures ($250 million gross), with Gene Hackman, Jon Voight, Regina King, Loren Dean, Barry Pepper, and Gabriel Byrne. Smith expanded his action-comedy palette and reunited with director Barry Sonnenfeld for the steampunk-style remake from Warner Bros., Wild Wild West (1999), with Kevin Kline, Kenneth Branagh, Salma Hayek, and Ted Levine.

Smith continued in period form with DreamWorks Pictures/20^th Century Fox’s baseball-themed The Legend of Bagger Vance (2000), directed by Robert Redford and co-starring Matt Damon and Charlize Theron. Smith went from baseball to boxing to portray Muhammad Ali for Michael Mann’s biopic, Ali (2001), with Jamie Foxx, Jon Voight, Mario Van Peebles, Ron Silver, Jeffrey Wright, and Mykelti Williamson and earned Smith his first Best Actor Oscar nomination.

Will Smith successfully reunited with co-star Martin Lawrence and director Michael Bay for another round in the wild, stunt-filled Bad Boys II (2003), written by Ron Shelton and Jerry Stahl, with Jorge Molla and Gabrielle Union. Smith was both star and executive producer for the first time with 20^th Century Fox’s $353-million-grossing I, Robot (2004), based on a premise from sci-fi master Isaac Asimov, with Bridget Moynihan, Bruce Greenwood, and James Cromwell under Alex Proyas’ direction.

Smith took on his first voice role in an animated feature with DreamWorks Animation’s $375-million-grossing Shark Tale (2004), co-starring the voices of Robert De Niro, Renée Zellweger, Angelina Jolie, Jack Black, and Martin Scorsese. Smith then starred in one of his few rom-coms, Columbia Pictures/Sony Pictures’ Hitch (2005), with Eva Mendes, Kevin James, and Adam Arkin, under Andy Tennant’s direction.

Will Smith landed his second Best Actor Oscar nomination with the biopic based on Chris Gardner’s and Quincy Troupe’s book, The Pursuit of Happyness (2006), co-starring Thandiwe Newton and Jaden Smith, and grossed $307 million for Columbia/Sony. Smith returned to his favorite genre—science fiction—with the Richard Matheson adaptation directed by Francis Lawrence, I Am Legend (2007), earning a strong $585 million for Warner Bros.

Smith played the unconventional superhero, Hancock (2008), directed by Peter Berg and co-written by Vy Vincent Ngo and Vince Gilligan, for Columbia/Sony (a terrific $629 million global gross), with Charlize Theron, Jason Bateman, and Eddie Marsan. Smith worked again with director Gabriele Muccino as star of Columbia/Sony’s inspirational drama earning $169 million, Seven Pounds (2008), co-starring Rosario Dawson, Michael Ealy, Barry Pepper, and Woody Harrelson.

Will Smith proved again to be the king of sci-fi as star/producer/story writer of director/co-writer/co-producer M. Night Shyamalan’s After Earth (2013), with Smith’s son, Jaden Smith, and earning $244 million for Columbia/Sony. Smith starred as a con artist with Margot Robbie as a femme fatale in the Glenn Ficarra and John Requa-directed Focus (2015), taking in $158 million for Warner Bros.

Smith returned to his regular home at Columbia/Sony and the sports-themed biopic genre with a starring role in director-writer Peter Landesman’s Concussion (2015), with Alec Baldwin, Gugu Mbatha-Raw, Arliss Howard, Paul Reiser, Luke Wilson, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje, David Morse, and Albert Brooks. Smith came aboard his first comic book superhero movie with Jared Leto, Margot Robbie, Joel Kinnaman, and Viola Davis as co-stars in DC Comics Films’ and Warner Bros.’ $749-million-grossing Suicide Squad (2016), written and directed by David Ayer.

Will Smith led the impressive cast of the Warner Bros.-released fantasy drama, Collateral Beauty (2016), co-starring Edward Norton, Helen Mirren, Keira Knightley, Michael Peña, Naomie Harris, Jacob Latimore, and Kate Winslet, under David Frankel’s direction. Will Smith took on one of his rare voice roles in the critically-praised but commercially disappointing animated spy comedy from Blue Sky Studios, Spies in Disguise (2019), with the voice cast of Tom Holland, Rashida Jones, Ben Mendelsohn, Reba McEntire, Rachel Brosnahan, and Karen Gillan, and released by 20^th Century Fox.

Smith’s first Disney movie and first Guy Ritchie movie was as the Genie in Aladdin (2019), with the diverse cast of Mena Massoud, Naomi Scott, Marwan Kenzari, and Navid Negahban, and which racked up booty of over $1 billion for the Mouse House. Smith reunited with his Bad Boys producer, Jerry Bruckheimer, and played twin roles for director Ang Lee in the long-in-development sci-fi thriller, Gemini Man (2019), with Mary Elizabeth Winstead, Clive Owen, and Benedict Wong, but losing money ($173.5 million returns on $138 million costs) for distributor Paramount.

Smith stayed with Bruckheimer for a reunion with co-star Martin Lawrence on the successful ($426.5 million) franchise reboot, Bad Boys for Life (2020), helmed by the directing duo of Adil & Bilall with Vanessa Hudgens, Alexander Ludwig, Paola Nunez, Charles Melton, Kate del Castillo. Smith produced and won the Best Actor Oscar for Warner Bros.’ King Richard (2021), one of his few movies that won over critics but not audiences, and co-starred Oscar-nominated Aunjanue Ellis, Saniyya Sidney, Demi Singleton, Tony Goldwyn, and Jon Bernthal, under Reinaldo Marcus Green’s direction.

Will Smith faced post-slap backlash for his performance in the widely-panned slave-era drama, Emancipation (2022), directed by Antoine Fuqua and released in a limited theatrical window by Apple TV+. Smith then returned to familiar territory for another round of nabbing bad guys with Martin Lawrence and co-directors Adil & Bilall in the sequel, Bad Boys: Ride or Die (2024), from Columbia Pictures/Sony Pictures Releasing.

Smith has amassed a considerable roster of credits as a producer or executive producer of movies in which he did not appear, including Saving Face (2004), ATL (2006), The Human Contract (2008), The Secret Lives of Bees (2008), Lakeview Terrace (2008), The Karate Kid (2010), This Means War (2012), Annie (2014), Life in a Year (2020), and Karate Kid (2025).