Offering her take on the boycott
‘ Fresh Prince’ actress Janet Hubert calls Jada Pinkett Smith’s move ‘ suspect.’
When actress Janet Hubert posted a video to her Facebook page Monday night, she said she had no idea it would get picked up by the national news media and shared widely on social media. Then again, she was criticizing her former “Fresh Prince of Bel- Air” costar Will Smith’s wife, Jada Pinkett Smith, who had called for a boycott of the Oscars over the list of all- white acting nominees.
“I was looking at this ridiculousness people called a historic moment, and I was annoyed,” she said in an interview with The Times. “It dilutes the movement when you only stand up for yourself. I’m a real freedom fighter. I’m not a pretend freedom f ighter. I stand up for other actresses, other people.”
Hubert is known best for playing Aunt Viv on “Fresh Prince,” which began in 1990.
But after she was replaced by Daphne Reid in 1993 — amid reports that Hubert was difficult to work with — the actress said she was blacklisted. After watching Pinkett Smith’s suggestion that people not watch or attend the Oscars, Hubert said she chose to let her voice, and “the real story” about her “Fresh Prince” dismissal, be heard. The selfproclaimed “blacktress” detailed her experience in her 2009 memoir, “Perfection Is Not a Sitcom Mom.”
The Times spoke with Hubert by phone Tuesday. This is an edited version of the interview.
You’re known for doing videos about popular culture, but they’re often in a character. You chose not to do one for this. Why?
I didn’t want to do a character because I wanted this to be me. I wanted to speak from my heart about how I felt because people really don’t know me. They know Vivian Banks, but they don’t know Janet Hubert.
This is my way of letting loose what I feel inside as an actress who’s been blocked. The wonderful thing about the Internet is that nobody can stop you.
In the video, you say that the calls to boycott the Academy Awards are “not that deep.” What do you mean by that?
We are not brain surgeons. We are not curing cancer. We are not finding the next cure for Alzheimer’s. We are simply and merely entertainment. We take on and wear the masks of characters. That’s what we’re paid to do. Someone like Will Smith has not come up through the ranks like most actors, so for him to be complaining the most is the most ridiculous thing I have ever seen.
So you’re not saying diversity in Hollywood isn’t an issue?
We’re all complaining about diversity in Hollywood, but we’ve got to address the colorism within the black community of Hollywood first. I’m called “dark- skinned Aunt Viv.” [ Reid] is called “lightskinned Aunt Viv.” The whole ridiculousness of black Hollywood — there is no black Hollywood. It’s every man for himself. We’ve got to address that first before we can start attacking someone else’s awards that were never designed for us.
The Oscars were never designed for us. There are actors who have never gotten an Oscar and have done amazing work. If you are waiting for an award of a little ... gold statue and that’s supposed to validate you, then you’re not in this business for the right reasons. We do the work. It’s about the work. It’s about taking the pages of a script and bringing them to life. It ain’t that deep. We get paid a lot of money to do very little work.
Are you saying that some top- level black people in Hollywood have lost sight of the real experience of actors?
People are dying. I have Sallie Mae bills up the ... to pay. When people come see what we do, we offer them a little escape. That’s all we provide. But you can’t start believing your own press kit. And if you weren’t going to stand up 25 years ago ....
They forget and start living in that big house with all that money and all that adoration. And we put these people on the pedestal, so the public has to take some blame. You created the monsters who are smiling in your face. How dare you ask other actors to jeopardize their positions. Take it from me … [ I was] blacklisted. I couldn’t feed my child. But what I always had was my dignity and I always will.
People have said you’re bitter for bringing up “old stuff.”
Every day of my life, I’ve had to deal with “old stuff.” Every time I try to move forward, somebody brings up “Fresh Prince.” Every time I walk into a room or make a phone call, somebody brings up “Fresh Prince.” I brought that story up simply to say, “You didn’t stand up 25 or whatever years ago to get more money for your cast” — and I asked him as a fellow actor, not as the person who owned the show. … I brought it up to say that if you don’t stand up all the time, you can’t pick and choose when you decide to stand up.
What then do you have to say regarding the broader issue of diversity in Hollywood, as it pertains to award shows?
Why do people need awards? Don’t you know your value and your worth? I don’t need anybody’s award or acceptance. We have a bigger problem. There needs to be huge changes in the system, but it’s not our system. Let’s make our own system. But I don’t want to hear those two. When you don’t stand up for the people who helped you get your start and now you’re asking people to stand up with you, it’s ironic to me. And it’s suspect.
Do you think any of the films this year featuring black leads deserved nominations?
When I finally sat down and got past the grittiness and ugliness of [“Beasts of No Nation”], I just got chills. Those boys deserved a nomination, but what are you going to do? They aren’t our awards. Idris Elba is perfectly pleased with his work. He’s not complaining. That’s what we do as actors. Our job is not to get awards.
trevell. anderson @ latimes. com