Last year, fans of the popular ’90s sitcom “Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” were elated to discover that Will Smith and his former co-star Janet Hubert had hashed out their differences after following her nearly three-decade-long dispute with him.
The pair reunited during a reunion special that debuted on HBO Max in mid-November 2020, where they shared an in-depth conversation about how Hubert’s life and career were affected following her departure.
During a recent appearance on Chris Witherspoon’s show “PopViewers,” published on YouTube in late February, the “New Eden” star elaborated on her life journey following her exit from the series. Hubert revealed that she faced an immense amount of pressure from a new business, raising an infant son, and just life as a whole.
“You’re only as good as the last job you ever did. We also know that you can make money and the next day you can have no money. I also had just opened up a studio. I signed a 10-year lease at like $60,000 to $100,000 worth of equipment,” Hubert explained around the 20-minute mark. “I had a franchise to develop. I not only had a house, a mortgage, a husband who wasn’t working at the time, but I also had a business and a baby, an infant who needed me desperately.”
The actress said that she struggled so much that she even felt like she wanted to die, but the thought of her son kept her going.
“He saved me. He really did. My son. Because I knew I had to take care of that little boy,” she told Witherspoon. “‘Fresh Prince’ had not gone into syndication yet, so there was no money for a few years until they did enough episodes to make syndication. I was in the third season negotiating for the fourth season. It was hard. There were moments when I felt so broken. So low. I didn’t know what I could do. There were moments where I wanted to die.”
When asked explicitly if she had ever contemplated suicide, Hubert said “absolutely.” She revealed that she hit her ultimate low following an incident with a fellow tenant that resulted in her doing hundreds of community service hours. “I figured I had a life insurance policy that would take care of my son because you figured … I’m not gonna make it,” she explained. “I can’t live through this. This is too much. People would attack. People would say things. People would say hurtful things, but he was an infant. What was I going to do?”
Check out the full interview with Janey Hubert and Chris Witherspoon down below.
