Will Smith is speaking candidly about his unconventional marriage with wife Jada Pinkett-Smith.
In a new GQ magazine cover story, which includes excerpts from Smith’s upcoming memoir, Will, Smith reveals that he and Pinkett-Smith didn’t always practice monogamy in their marriage.
“Jada never believed in conventional marriage…Jada had family members that had an unconventional relationship,” Will says of his wife of 23 years. “So she grew up in a way that was very different than how I grew up. There were significant endless discussions about, what is relational perfection? What is the perfect way to interact as a couple? And for the large part of our relationship, monogamy was what we chose, not thinking of monogamy as the only relational perfection.”
Smith, who shares son Jaden, 23, and daughter Willow, 20, with Jada, says he and his wife decided to do a Red Table Talk about their relationship as a way to protect themselves from “public scrutiny” following singer August Alsina‘s comments that he and Jada had an affair.
“The pursuit of truth is the only way to be happy in this lifetime,” Will shares. “And we sort of came to the agreement that authenticity was the release from the shackles of fame…”
Smith believes that their openness has allowed for “trust and freedom.”
“Marriage for us can’t be a prison,” Smith says. “And I don’t suggest our road for anybody. But the experiences that the freedoms that we’ve given one another and the unconditional support, to me, is the highest definition of love.”
During the interview, Smith also admits that he’s been working with an intimacy coach and that one of his greatest fantasies was to have a harem of girlfriends — which included Misty Copeland and Halle Berry.
Smith says he eventually realized, “That would be horrific.”
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