Will Smith recently appeared on Kevin Hart's Hart to Heart Peacock talk show, and the two comedian/action stars discussed how Smith became one of the greatest blockbuster film actors of the late '90s.
Smith's Independence Day was released in 1996, followed by Men in Black, which was released in 1997. However, the former Fresh Prince of Bel-Air star, confessed that he initially didn't want to make Men In Black. Until the film's producer, Steven Spielberg got involved.
"I didn't want to make Men In Black- that was the next year after Independence Day. So, I didn't want to make two alien movies back-to-back."
When Kevin Hart asked him how did Steven Spielberg convince him, Will Smith replied, "Steven Spielberg sent a helicopter for me. I was in New York [at the time]. The helicopter landed at his house...He flew me in, and he said the coldest sh**."
"He said, 'Tell me why you don't want to make my movie.'... And there was the dot, dot, dot on the end. If he would have continued, he would've said, 'Joker, you know I made Jaws. Or, you know I made E.T. I walked in his house and he had the Jaws poster, the Jurassic Park poster. He had everything, so I would know. "
Listening to Spielberg definitely proved to be the right decision for Will Smith, as Men In Black was the highest-grossing film of 1997, generating $250,690,539 million for Sony. Spielberg also had a good year in '97 as The Lost World: Jurassic Park was the second-highest-earning domestic picture that year, making $229,086,679 million.
Men In Black was based on the 1990 Malibu Comics series by writer Lowell Cunningham and illustrator Sandy Carruthers. The comic inspired three live-action films starring Tommy Lee Jones and Smith, as well as a 2019 spinoff film that starred Chris Hemsworth and Tessa Thompson.
An animated series set directly after the first film aired from 1997 to 2001, consisting of 53 episodes across 4 seasons on Kid's WB.
Men In Black Official Synopsis: Men in Black follows the exploits of agents Kay (Tommy Lee Jones) and Jay (Will Smith), members of a top-secret organization established to monitor alien activity on Earth. The two MiB find themselves in the middle of the deadly plot by an intergalactic terrorist (Vincent D'Onofrio) who has arrived on Earth to assassinate two ambassadors from opposing galaxies.