Will Smith’s Fresh Prince aunt Janet Hubert blasts actor and wife Jada for Oscars boycott

THE woman who played Will Smith’s aunt on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air has some harsh words for the actor and his wife Jada Pinkett Smith.

‘You didn’t deserve a nomination’

JANET Hubert, who played Will Smith’s aunt Viv on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air has slammed the actor and his wife Jada Pinkett Smith over their Oscars boycott.

In response to Pinkett Smith, who said she may boycott the Academy Awards due to the lack of black nominees, Hubert blasted the couple with a Facebook video titled “To the Smiths!”

In the four-minute video, Hubert questions the couple’s motivation and Will Smith’s acting ability.

“First of all, miss thing,” the 60-year-old says, referring to Pinkett Smith, “does your man not have a mouth of his own with which to speak?”

“The second thing, girlfriend, there’s a lot of sh*t going on in the world that you all don’t seem to recognise. People are dying. Our boys are being shot left and right. People are starving. People are trying to pay bills. And you’re talking about some motherf**king actors and Oscars. It just ain’t that deep.”

Hubert went further and criticised Pinkett Smith for asking “other black actresses and actors” to “jeopardise their career” in Hollywood. She said she found it “ironic” they were planning to boycott the people who helped them make their living just because Smith didn’t receive a nomination.

Will Smith and Hubert had creative differences on Fresh Prince.

She then recalled an incident that occurred during the Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air years, where Smith refused to negotiate his contract alongside the rest of the cast.

“Well, karma must be a b*tch, cause now here you are,” she said. “Here you are, you’ve had a few flops and you know there are those out there who really deserved a nod.”

Describing Idris Elba, who also missed out on a nomination for his role in Beasts of No Nation, as an “incredible actor”, Hubert didn’t have quite the same praise for Smith’s work.

“You are not,” she said. “Maybe you didn’t deserve a nomination. I didn’t think, frankly, you deserved a Golden Globes nomination with that accent, but you got one. And just because the world doesn’t go the way you want it to go, doesn’t mean you can go out and start asking people to stand up and sing We Shall Overcome for you.

To the Smiths!

Posted by Janet Hubert on Monday, January 18, 2016

“You ain’t Barack and Michelle Obama. And you all need to get over yourselves. You have a huge production company that you only produce your friends, your family, and yourself. So you are a part of Hollywood, you are a part of the system that is unfair to other actors, so get real!”

The feud between Hubert and Smith has been longstanding, with their creative differences leading to her being fired from the ’90s sitcom in 1993 and replaced with Daphne Reid.

Following the outcry over the all-white nominations, Academy president Cheryl Boone Isaacs has also released a statement today saying she is “heartbroken and frustrated” at the “lack of inclusion”.

In a statement, Mrs Isaacs said it is a difficult but important conversation, and that it is time for a big change.

“The Academy is taking dramatic steps to alter the makeup of our membership,” she said.

“In the coming days and weeks, we will conduct a review of our membership recruitment in order to bring about much-needed diversity in our 2016 class and beyond.”

When the Oscar nominations were announced last week and Will Smith (Concussion), Idris Elba (Beasts of No Nation), and Samuel L Jackson (The Hateful Eight) were noticeably snubbed, there was an immediate backlash on Twitter.