Jada Pinkett Smith: from bold ingenue to Hollywood wife to Britney's funky opening act, what drove this unstoppable dreamer to take up music? Here she breaks it down for a fellow risk taker

Interview, August, 2004 by Tom Cruise

With 18 movies, three kids, and one husband to her already bold-faced name, what drove Jada Pinkett Smith to song? As the vocalist and lyricist for her funk-rock band Wicked Wisdom, which recently released its debut album, My Story, and opened for Britney Spears on her European tour, Pinkett Smith brings a fiery, fierce presence to the stage that fans of her film work know all too well. Back in her day job, Pinkett Smith can be seen in this month's thriller Collateral, directed by Michael Mann and starring her interviewer, Tom Cruise.

JADA PINKETT SMITH: So, what you going to ask me, Tom?

TOM CRUISE: I've never interviewed anybody, ever, but I wanted to interview you. I've been thinking so much about you as an artist and a person: You're a mother, an actress, a producer, and then there's you and [husband Will Smith]--and all of a sudden, you're a rock star. [both laugh] You're a rock star!

JPS: I don't know if I'm a rock star.

TC: One of the things I'm interested in is where you started and where you are now.

JPS: Nobody would believe the journey of my life. I always say that if you look at life as a chessboard, I started without the king and the queen. [both laugh] I had a young mother and a very young father, and I was in the midst of these two young people trying to grow from adolescence to adulthood. At one time I was living with my mother in Park Heights [in Baltimore], which was a neighborhood full of desperate, uneducated people who were brought down and oppressed by their lack of opportunity. I look back and go, "How did I make it out of there?"

TC: It's inspiring.

JPS: But I have to say that I wouldn't change a moment of it because it prepared me for what was to come. Growing up in the neighborhoods that I grew up in and having a mother who was addicted to heroin, I had to learn to be a spiritual, emotional, intellectual, and physical fighter at a young age. And it just prepared me for the struggle. Nobody was going to stop me. So by the time I got to L.A., I was fearless. And I just kept that mentality, like I'm going to get mine no matter what.

TC: When some people say stuff like that, the thing that I think is important is keeping your integrity. And from what I know of you as a person, there is an integrity there.

JPS: Well, I learned early that the only thing you have in this world is your integrity. You have to be able to get up in the morning and look at yourself. So I knew that I wasn't going to put myself in a compromising situation where I owed anybody anything. When I walked into a room, either you like what you see as far as my talent's concerned, or fuck it, somebody else will. [Cruise laughs] People look at me as a hard ass, though, and that's been hard for me.

TC: See, I don't think that anybody could not respond to you, because you're a warm person.

JPS: That's because you know me, Tom.

TC: No, I think there's a thing when you look at someone who has ethics presence, when it's like, you're going to have to deal with me as a human being. I went to a lot of different schools growing up, so I can relate to that. It's like, I am who I am.

JPS: I also had a very loving, supporting family: my grandmother, who was very involved in my life, and my aunts and my uncles. The attitude that I can do anything is from my grandmother. She was like, "I am going to prepare you in a way that you cannot be denied anything."

TC: I think it's easy to see how you've grown as an artist--there hasn't been much stasis. We were making [Collateral], and you came over to the house and just started singing. I went, "What? This girl can sing." And then all of a sudden, there you are onstage, going on tour with Britney.

JPS: I can't even express to you the place that I go when I'm onstage singing. It is unlike anything I've ever experienced before. It's such a freedom. It's a place that is purifying and cleansing; it's trouble-free and soul-filled. And working with Michael, he helps me find that space in my acting. He approaches movies like theater, with the process of discovery that I love so much.

TC: Discovery--that's the thing some people don't necessarily understand. They go, "Why do you want to do it?" Don't you find it a buzz, that moment where you're discovering?

JPS: I look for those moments of discovery every day of my life. Whether it's about myself or Will, or if I pick up a book and flip through it.

TC: What also struck me was when Will, who was in the middle of finishing his movie [I, Robot], went to London the night that you performed for the first time. You know, I've been there with women: It's like you see them do well, and there's such a sense of "that's my girl."

JPS: "She could not have done that without me!" [both laugh]

TC: And that communion is beautiful.

IPS: Right. When I look at Ali [2001], I go, "I helped you do that." You're right, that communion is so necessary in relationships.

TC: You can't have the "where are you going?"

JPS: "You think you're taking my kids to Europe on a damn bus?" Once again it's just understanding the necessity for your partner to live, like live, and reach their full potential.