< The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air

The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air/Characters


Main Cast

Will Smith (Will Smith)

The title character. Once a street-wise youth in Philadelphia, a skirmish with a bully causes Will to be sent to live with his wealthy relatives in Bel-Air, California. The show focuses on Will living and interacting with the upper-class society and residential celebrities. Later on, there's more focus on Will's college life.

  • The Ace
  • Anti-Hero: Type II on the Sliding Scale.
  • Berserk Button: God help you if you insult his mother.
  • Big Brother Mentor: To Ashley.
  • Big Man on Campus
  • Breaking the Fourth Wall: Will does this at least once every three episodes, if not more.
  • Brilliant but Lazy
  • Casanova
  • Character Development: Primarily regarding his relationship with Carlton. Early on, Will gives Carlton grief about not being black enough, but eases off once he sees Carlton face discrimination from other blacks for exactly this and realizes how asinine and unfair it is.
    • Will was pretty much sought to retain his free-will "Homeboy" lifestyle when first settling in Bel-Air, but has become more accustomed to it and more open about his knowledge of numerous references.
  • The Danza: Played straight with an undertone of subversion: Real-life Will's full first name is "Willard." In-show, Will's full first name is "William." It also applies to his last name of Smith, too.
    • This was on Alfonso Ribeiro's advice, as he told Will ahead of time that people would be calling him by the character's name for the rest of his life. (An accurate prediction, as Ribeiro himself is still being called "Carlton" by fans on the street all these years later.)
  • Deadpan Snarker
  • Disappeared Dad: Will's father Lou took off on the family when he was a baby and left his mother to raise him. When Lou comes back, he briefly tries to reconcile with Will but proves he's still the same selfish bastard he always was when he effectively abandons Will once again. This led to one of the series' biggest Tear Jerkers when he tearfully asked Uncle Phil:

Will: How come he don't want me, man?

  • Heterosexual Life Partners: With Jazz. Though less so in the later seasons.
  • High School Hustler
  • I Have No Son: Inverted with Will and his father Lou. When Lou comes back into Will's life after having run out on him 14 years ago, Lou then abandons him again for another trucking job. This is the final exchange Will and Lou share:

Lou: It was great seeing you, son.
Will: You too...Lou.

Phillip Banks (James Avery)

A successful attorney (later appointed a court judge) who doesn't try hide his reluctance to Will settling in with the Banks. Spends a good portion of the show dealing with Will's antics and help fix any mess made.

  • Berserk Button: On a comical side, any scheme that blows up in Will's and sometime's Carlton's faces. On a more serious side, hurting his family and telling him that he gone soft when he has done his fair share of fighting for Civil Rights is sure to put him through Tranquil Fury and his speeches are just as lethal as his temper as the result.

Phil: You talk as if I wasn't there with you in Birmingham facing dogs and firehoses. This is me, Olfame, the same Olfame that was with you the night Harlem went up in flames. But now I have a family, and I choose not to fight in the streets. I have an office to fight from and I have fought and won cases for fair housing, affirmative action, health care, and I am not ashamed to write a big fat check for something I believe in and that doesn't make me any less committed than you, so don't you dare look down your damn nose at me, Adabola.

  • Best Served Cold: Normally when Will and Carlton's antics go too far, Phillip just screams and threatens them. However in the episode "Best Laid Plans." Will goes further than that. To elaborate, Will wanted to have sex with his then girlfriend of the week, however she doesn't believe in sex before marriage. So Will stages an elaborate wedding, with Jazz as the minister. However his conscience gets to him before he goes through with the deed. Naturally the girlfriend, punches him out and steals Phil's Mercedes, causing Will to confess the deed to Phil. Phil goes beyond yelling and is eerily calm stating that he isn't gonna punish Will. Will thinks he's out of the woods, but Phil reiterates. He doesn't plan on punishing him today or even tomorrow. Will's scheme was so bad, that he has to think long and hard about just what he's about to do to him and tells him to worry about it, before doing his trademark Shredder Laugh. It takes him 3 years and reading a book on Medieval Tortures, to figure out what he wants to do to Will. Thankfully (or not), the credits roll before we see what he has planned.

Phil: I'm not gonna punish you today. Maybe not even tomorrow. You see I need to think a long long time about just what I'm going to do with you. I don't know, it might come to me in the middle of the night. Or maybe next week. Or a few years from now. In the mean time, why don't you worry about it. Be afraid Will. Be very afraid.

  • Big Eater: It ends up giving him a heart attack in an episode.
  • Bald Black Leader Guy: Not a leader, per se, but more than a few plots show that he's in charge of the family.
  • Bumbling Dad: Very much averted. He has his moments of stupidity, but he's portrayed as competent and knowledgeable way more often than other sitcom dads. His children are also (for the most part) far too scared of him to show the disrespect the archetype typically gets. The only one that really mouths off to him is Will, and even Will knows where the line is.
  • Embarrassing Nickname: "Zeke," by his parents.
  • Hair-Trigger Temper: "Uncle Phil is a very big man, with a very short fuse. Bad combination. Very bad combination."
  • Happily Married: To Vivian.
  • Hidden Depths: He may not seem it, but he was heavily involved in the Civil Rights Movement. He's also one HELL of a pool player.

"Geoffrey, break out Lucille."

Vivian Banks (Janet Hubert-Whitten, 1990-1993; Daphne Maxwell Reid, 1993-1996)

Will's aunt whose more open and patient with Will when he moves with the Banks.

  • Annoying Patient: During the last month of her pregnancy.
  • Happily Married: To Phillip.
  • Lethal Chef
  • Lysistrata Gambit: Employs this a LOT. Often overlaps with Exiled to the Couch.
  • Mama Bear
  • Mean Character, Nice Actor: Inverted. While Vivian Banks was a pleasant, kind, tolerant character, Janet Hubert-Whitten was an absolute nightmare to work with, and treated pretty much everyone with contempt. She still blames Will Smith for getting her fired (likely because she hates rappers and couldn't care less that Will was a "clean" one as opposed to "gangsta", and despised him from the moment she heard she'd be working with him), but Alfonso Ribeiro insists that the entire cast teamed up and demanded something be done about her.
  • Not So Stoic: She's usually more reserved and reasonable than Phillip, but she can lose it when a matter specifically bothers her.
    • If she starts taking her earrings off, be warned.
  • The Other Darrin: She was originally played by Janet Hubert-Whitten. From the fourth season on, she was replaced by Daphne Maxwell Reid (there was even a lampshade about the fact that Vivian's skin color change, as the original actress had dark brown skin while her replacement was a light-skinned black woman).
  • Sassy Black Woman: She can slip into this when she gets upset.

Carlton Banks (Alfonso Ribeiro)

The middle child of the Banks family who strives to get into Princeton and be a successful lawyer like his dad. More confident in the law and order in general, Carlton's at odds with Will more than frequently, though by the later half of the series he becomes The Lancer.

Hilary Banks (Karyn Parsons)

The spoiled elder child of the Banks family, Hilary's socialite bent on looked highly upon her peers in the upper class. She's also leeches off her parents' fortune and ignorant of how life outside hers really works.

Ashley Banks (Tatyana M. Ali)

The youngest child of the Banks (until Baby Nicky arrived), she very much looked up to Will. Gradually, she became bent on being less of daddy's little girl and more open and a bit rebellious, even out of Will's control. She is the only one of the Banks children to have, more or less, normal adolescence; having common teenager issues.

  • Bratty Teenage Daughter: Averted, except in one case where she had a singing career and got a big head, but when her album didn't sell, she went back to being her sweet self.
  • Closer to Earth: Than Carlton and Hilary.
  • Daddy's Girl: She fights this trope for much of the show before eventually accepting and appreciating her father's concern.
  • Light Feminine and Dark Feminine: The light to Hilary's dark.
  • Life Imitates Art: In one episode Ashley seems ready to hit it big with a music career. She gets a swelled head, steps on the people who got her there, and then her career bombs and she has to eat crow and apologize. Pretty much the exact same thing happened when Tatyana Ali tried to have a singing career.
  • One-Hit Wonder: when she started her singing career.
  • She's All Grown Up: Naturally through the seasons, though Uncle Phil is reluctant to accept this.
  • She Cleans Up Nicely: The older she gets, the prettier she gets and the more overprotective Uncle Phil gets.
    • As well as Will and Carlton. Ask Jaleel White.
  • Spoiled Sweet

Geoffrey Butler (Joseph Marcell)

The Banks family butler, an older English man who outside of the witty barbs has a great relationship with the family.

Nicky Banks (Ross Bagley)

The youngest of the Banks children, born during the run of the show. But don't let that make you think he didn't have any Character Development, he grew as much as the others did.

Phillip: Nicky, do you remember in The Lion King, when Mufasa-
Nicky: Dad, did you sit on Harry?

Recurring Characters

Jazz (DJ Jazzy Jeff/Jeffrey A. Townes)

  • Casanova
  • Chekhov's Shirt: Since they constantly reused the same clip of Jazz getting thrown out of the house, they maintained continuity by having Jazz wear the same shirt in almost every episode he gets thrown out. It gets to the point where you can tell the Running Gag is about to occur if you see him wearing the shirt.
  • Drop-In Character
  • Heterosexual Life Partners: With Will.
  • Limited Wardrobe: Because of his being thrown out of the house is Stock Footage, he always wears the same outfit when he's about to get thrown out.
  • Running Gag: His tendency to get thrown out of the Bankses' house.
    • Inverted, subverted, and averted a couple of times, such as when he was thrown into the house, when Jazz threw Uncle Phil out the house, and when Jazz did something so horrible that Will doesn't think he's worth kicking out of the house.

Viola "Vi" Smith (Vernee Watson-Johnson)

  • The Other Darrin: A small case, but who did play Will's mom in the opening sequence?
    • It's the "mom figure" used in Smith's DJ Jazzy Jeff and Fresh Prince videos (particularly "Parents Just Don't Understand").
  • Sassy Black Woman
  • Why Waste a Wedding?: Will and Lisa sure took their single parents marrying each other quite well.

Hattie "Granny" Banks (Virginia Capers)

Kellogg "Cornflake" Lieberbaum (Michael Weiner)

Tyriq "Ty" Johnson (Perry Moore)

  • The Generic Guy: He isn't the clever one, or the dumb one, or the quirky one, he is just this guy who feeds lines.

Trevor Collins/Newsworthy (Brian Stokes Mitchell)

News anchorman, whom Hilary falls for.

Helen Smith (Jennifer Lewis)

Judge Carl Robertson (Sherman Hemsley)

  • And There Was Much Rejoicing: At the judge's funeral, Will admitted his part of Robertson's death; everyone in the room applauded.
  • Bitch in Sheep's Clothing
  • Broken Pedestal
  • Cloudcuckoolander
  • Jerkass: Judge Robertson was apparently idealistic in his younger days, but as of the show's timeline he's become extremely selfish, misogynistic, deceitful, and a classic example of a corrupt politician. He was such an awful human being that at his funeral, everyone was there to celebrate his death, and they even applaud Will when they learn that he caused it.
  • You Look Familiar: Hemsley also made two separate appearances as George Jefferson, alongside Isabel Sanford as Wheezy.

Jacqueline "Jackie" Ames (Tyra Banks)

  • Aborted Arc: And a sad one because she was shaping up to be an interesting character.
  • Sassy Black Woman
  • Unrequited Love Switcheroo: It's implied that Jackie had a lingering crush on Will before he left and that he hadn't quite realized his feelings until he was gone, thus explaining why he never called because he missed her too much and didn't want to come to terms with his feelings. When she comes out to Bel-Air, Will starts to fall for her again, though the situation suffers from Aborted Arc and is never resolved.

Lisa Wilkes (Nia Long)

  • You Look Familiar: Long previously played another girlfriend of Will's three seasons earlier.
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