“His hair loss was much more extreme than mine,” Jada Pinkett Smith says of 2Pac.
Jada Pinkett Smith and Tupac Shakur had a long-standing friendship. It’s no wonder that this relationship takes up a large part of the actress’ memoir. In “Worthy” she reveals, among other things, that the rapper – like the artist herself – suffered from the autoimmune disease alopecia.
Shakur’s first symptoms were said to have occurred after he was arrested in 1991, recalls Pinkett Smith. The rapper was arrested by Oakland police for crossing the street during a red light. He did sue the officials, but the case was later settled without any result. “After being with the police officers who beat him in Northern California, he started losing his hair. And his hair loss was much more extreme than mine,” his long-time girlfriend explains to the US magazine “People”.
Alopecia usually manifests itself as excessive hair loss and can affect any body hair. It ranges from thinning in places to complete baldness. Although androgenetic alopecia usually occurs more often in men than women, Jada Pinkett Smith was also diagnosed with the autoimmune disease in 2018. Unlike Tupac Shakur, the actress speaks publicly about her hair loss.
“I don’t think Pac ever talked about his alopecia, but he looked really good even with a bald head,” Pinkett Smith continued. “But that was at a time and in an era in which people didn’t want to talk about it – he just didn’t want to talk about it.” But the actress was sure that the musician, who was murdered in 1996, would talk about his illness today .
The artists became friends when they were both studying at the Baltimore School for the Arts. In 2017, their connection also played a role in the rapper’s biopic “All Eyez on Me.” Although they were not a couple, Tupac Shakur proposed to her in 1995 while he was incarcerated for sexual abuse.
Pinkett Smith also addresses this experience in her memoirs, which will be published on October 17th – even though it was “one of the most painful parts” of writing for her. “When he asked me to marry him, I knew he needed someone to serve time with him, […] “He needed a rock,” she says in an episode of the “All The Smoke” podcast, which will be released on October 19th. “Because of our friendship and everything we’ve been through together, he just wanted to feel a solid foundation. Because I promise you, he would have married me and divorced me as soon as he got out of jail,” she tells hosts Matt Barnes and Stephen Jackson.
Most recently, Jada Pinkett Smith also shared details about her marriage to Will Smith. Although the couple has not legally filed for divorce, they have been living “completely separate lives” since 2016. “I think we were both still stuck in our fantasy of what the other person should be like,” Pinkett Smith said of her and the Hollywood actor’s marriage in 1997.