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Will Smith is sharing a lot of deep, dark details about his upbringing in his new memoir Will, including the fact that he once considered killing his father. In the book, the 53-year old actor opened up about his turbulent relationship with his father, sharing:
"My father was violent, but he was also at every game, play, and recital. He was an alcoholic, but he was sober at every premiere of every one of my movies. He listened to every record. He visited every studio. The same intense perfectionism that terrorized his family put food on the table every night of my life."
The famous father of three went on to disclose the gruesome details of how violent his father was to his mother, sharing:
"When I was nine years old, I watched my father punch my mother in the side of the head so hard that she collapsed. I saw her spit blood. That moment in that bedroom, probably more than any other moment in my life, has defined who I am."
The traumatizing incident has effected the King Richard star in various areas of his life.
Will continued:
"Within everything that I have done since then — the awards and accolades, the spotlights and attention, the characters and the laughs — there has been a subtle string of apologies to my mother for my inaction that day. For failing her in the moment. For failing to stand up to my father. For being a coward. What you have come to understand as "Will Smith," the alien-annihilating MC, the bigger-than-life movie star, is largely a construction – a carefully crafted and honed character – designed to protect myself. To hide myself from the world. To hide the coward."
Will's father, Willard Carroll Smith, Jr., passed away in 2016. Since then, the blockbuster star has been working to heal from his childhood trauma, and allowed the world to join him along in his journey.