Jada Pinkett-Smith has reflected on the time Tupac Shakur tried to propose to her when he was imprisoned in Rikers Island.
The actress and musician is currently promoting her upcoming memoir Worthy, which will be released next week (October 17). In it, she speaks in-depth about her friendship with the Death Row rapper, including when he proposed to her while in prison for sexual abuse charges in 1995.
In a recent appearance on the All The Smoke podcast, Pinkett-Smith said talking about Tupac in Rikers Island was “one of the most painful parts” for her while writing the book. “Seeing him there [in prison], the condition that he was in and having to leave him there, he was in bad shape,” she said.
She continued: “So when he asked me to get married, I knew at that time that: he needed somebody to do time with him which I was going to do anyway – you don’t have to marry me to do time, I’m here – but he needed a rock.
“Because of our friendship and because of everything we have been through together, he just wanted to feel that solidified foundation, you know? Because I promise you, he would have married and divorced me as soon as his ass left jail.”
This week, Jada was asked by RollingOut if she regretted not pursuing a relationship with Tupac.“It just wasn’t possible,” she replied. “There was no chemistry between us.”
2Pac was my soulmate — Jada Pinkett, despite being married to Will Smith for 19 yearspic.twitter.com/t3CWxXVPuh
— Instablog9ja (@instablog9ja) October 13, 2023
She called the ‘California Love’ rapper her “soulmate,” explaining: “Absolutely, we have soulmates, our children can be our soulmates. I think this kind of romanticised idea of like a soulmate – there’s all kinds of definitions of soulmates.”
The Wicked Wisdom frontwoman made headlines earlier this week when revealed that she and husband Will Smith have BEEN separated since 2016. She explained: “I think we were both kind of just still stuck in our fantasy of what we thought the other person should be.”
She also spoke more about the infamous spectacle of Will Smith slapping Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars ceremony. The first words he said to her after the slap were “Are you OK?”
In other news, Jada Pinkett-Smith also recently shared a clip of her and Tupac dancing to Will Smith’s Grammy Award-winning song ‘Parents Just Don’t Understand’.
Last month, Keefe D was arrested in connection to Tupac’s murder in 1996, having allegedly obtained the gun used “for the purpose of seeking retribution against Tupac.”