Philadelphia legend Beanie Sigel is playing as Jabari Banks walks down the streets of West Philly, the streets he grew up on. This could be a scene ripped straight out of the actor’s real life — but in fact, it’s a scene from the pilot episode of Bel-Air.
“[The] very first shot we did… we were in West Philly,” Banks remembers of the neighborhood known for Georgian row homes, rough cement sidewalks, and narrow roads. “[On] 60th and Market, the El trains going over us. Like in West Philly. I've walked these streets. I've been here before, and now they got this sh*t blocked off… I'm really living this story. My life is literally flipped, turned upside down. Two weeks [before production], I was sleeping on my friend's couch. And now I'm filming Bel-Air.”
Banks landed the role of a lifetime, this reimagining of his own world, when director, filmmaker, and Fresh Prince fan Morgan Cooper posed a question: “What would happen if Will Smith made The Fresh Prince today?” In the spring of 2019, Cooper uploaded his answer to YouTube: a four-minute short film titled Bel-Air.
The film was a modern expansion on the story of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air’s theme song, a story all about how a young teen from West Philly gets into trouble and is sent to live with relatives in a ritzy neighborhood of Los Angeles… you know the one. Yet, Cooper’s version had a darker tone that leaned into the most impactful themes and significant conflicts of the original series — themes like class and privilege, culture clash, Black masculinity, the liminality of belonging, and the journey of discovering and protecting one’s sense of self.
The project spread instantly among fans of the ‘90s sitcom, racking up millions of views and reactions on social media. Soon, it caught the eye of none other than the Fresh Prince himself. In an interview with Cooper a month after the short’s release, Will Smith praised the quality of the fan film, calling Cooper’s concept “brilliant” and acknowledging the vast amount of storytelling opportunities that lived within the longer format Cooper envisioned, compared to a half-hour sitcom structure.
The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, which ran from 1990 to 1996 and starred Will Smith as a fictionalized version of himself, is a tentpole of American popular culture and a landmark of Black representation on television. Within the comedic framework of a fish-out-of-water story, the beloved series simultaneously celebrated the bond of a Black family while also navigating the complexities of being Black in 1990s America. It’s a story of kinship steeped in flair and overpowering joy that helped push the boundaries of television — a story that has now been reimagined for a new generation. On February 13, Peacock will debut its new drama Bel-Air, with Cooper at the helm of the contemporary, inspired, and magnified approach to the iconic series.
The new series traces the aftermath of an almost deadly altercation between promising basketball star Will and a notorious figure of his West Philly neighborhood. In an effort to keep him out of danger and away from potential retaliation, Will’s mother interrupts his junior year of high school and sends him to live with her estranged sister’s family in California. Will’s relatives, the Banks family, are solid members of the Black elite: wealthy, influential, and refined. The unflinching reality of Will’s single-parent, lower-income upbringing couldn’t be more different from that of his posh cousins. A sudden Bel-Air transplant, Will is given a life-changing second chance, one that forces him to reexamine his relationships, his worldview, and his own identity. The second Will walks through the doors of the Banks family mansion, no one’s life will ever be the same.
Bel-Air reinterprets this classic story by moving forward into present-day and amplifying those complexities, using a longer format to further explore the gritty undercurrents of the initial series. After all, the stakes are high — though made light of in the original series, “one little fight” usually doesn’t send a mother into a spiral of fear strong enough to immediately ship her only child across the country.
Remarkably, a dramatic, modern reimagination creates more narrative, visual, and aesthetic possibilities; there’s more opportunity for darker-skinned representation; there’s more space to celebrate the connection of a Black family and the immensity of the Black experience; and there’s more time and flexibility to continue the conversations around Blackness that were begun in Fresh Prince, and further challenge different perspectives within the Black community. The original series was revolutionary for the ways in which it painstakingly and strategically illustrated the colorful spectrum of Black life, but there were innate limits due to the sitcom’s compact structure, as well as the time period.
Taking on the Goliath task of re-envisioning this seminal sitcom is daunting enough. Yet, Bel-Air co-showrunners T.J. Brady and Rasheed Newson said in a statement that the greatest challenge of developing the new series was actually finding a young actor to step into the role of Will Smith. Little did they know, their reimagined Fresh Prince was waiting in the wings of West Philadelphia, the story’s place of origin.
Banks was fresh out of theater school when he was cast as Bel-Air’s Will, and received the news on a surprise call with Smith. The 23-year-old is a newcomer to the industry, just like Smith was when he transitioned from burgeoning rapper-to-actor back in 1990.
“I remember the first time I met [Cooper] was actually in Philly,” Banks tells Teen Vogue over Zoom. He’s sitting in his trailer during his lunch break, still in costume from filming. Banks has a fresh familiarity akin to a young Smith — cool, confident, yet effervescent. Even through a computer screen, his magnetism is palpable. “I had done my callback and we were just talking, we chopped it up about life and about art and our passions. And at that moment — he tells me after I had booked the role — that is the moment that he knew that I was Will.”
Will Smith is also an executive producer on the series, though Banks says he’s stepped back for the most part, giving the new cast and crew an enormous amount of trust. “[Will] is really setting us up to succeed,” Banks says. “He called me after he watched the pilot. He was like, ‘Man, that was amazing. You did a great job.’ I got the chance to talk to Jaden [Smith], too. And he was like, ‘Man, you personified my dad really well.’ I heard they watched the pilot back twice.”
Through fresh tonal, wardrobe, and story decisions, Bel-Air ultimately aspires to be a genuine and authentic celebration of Black culture, and of the city of Philadelphia. The creative team tapped into Banks’ West Philly cultural fluency to keep the script and the show’s depiction of the historic city as realistic and contemporary as possible.
“To see how authentic the show is, is going to be super great for [the audience], especially people from Philly,” Banks says. “There's Philly legends [in the show]. We have Freeway as my coach, we got D4M$loan in there, Eazy the Block Captain, it’s gonna be great — the pilot episode is called ‘Dreams and Nightmares.’ That is a moment, you know what I mean,” a nod to Meek Mill’s debut album and underdog anthem.
Banks explains that he often pivots between his training and his own personal experiences in his portrayal of Will, reflecting on the many parallels that exist between himself and his character — parallels that make his casting of the iconic character seem almost inevitable.
“We're using the same characters and the same [premise], but there's so many other stories that we can dive deeper into now,” says Banks. “Cassandra Freeman [Bel-Air’s Aunt Viv] said it best. She said that looking into these characters is like if all of the characters from the original show had a journal… and we can dive deep into each one.”
And dive deep they are. “One of the main notes in the audition was, ‘This is not the Carlton that you’ve seen, this is completely different, treat this as its own thing,” says Olly Sholotan, who plays a radical new version of Will’s cousin Carlton Banks. “And the minute I read the script, I was like, oh, I can absolutely do that.”
In Fresh Prince, Carlton is one of the comedic backbones of the show, frequently used as a punchline. Bel-Air’s Carlton wields more power, but heavy is the head that wears the crown — especially when a Fresh Prince begins to encroach on his territory. In an early episode, we see Carlton fighting to cope with the pressures and consequences of Will’s arrival, a change that only amplifies the struggles he tries to hide. Carlton’s storyline positions the character to engage with heavier, edgier issues throughout the season, like mental health struggles and substance dependency.
Likewise, the character of Hilary Banks is turned on her head. The ditsy, spoiled fashion icon who became one of the most notable contributions to pop culture’s bougie Black girl archetype is now a go-getter girl boss and content creator in 2022. The modern version of Hilary is a bonafide multi-hyphenate with big dreams of becoming a chef. Yet, her vision of how to achieve these dreams drastically diverges from her parents’ traditional plans, which starts to create cracks in their relationship. Even so, Hilary’s broadened unrelenting confidence is an update to the character that Coco Jones relates to on a personal level.
“I was surprised and grateful,” says Jones, known for her work on Disney’s Let It Shine and Netflix’s Vampires vs. the Bronx. “I was surprised because I had all these preconceived notions of what I thought Hilary was supposed to be based on how she was portrayed in the [original] show and how she looked… in the back of my head, I was like, I don't know if it's me.”
But after conversations with creator Cooper about the new vision for the character, Jones came around to the idea of making Hilary her own. “She reminded me more of myself and what I bring to the table, my headstrong, self-assured, confident personality,” the 24-year-old admits. “We had several conversations about the goal of Hilary being relatability. The last thing that we [wanted] was for people, or especially women and women of color, to not see themselves in her, in her struggles and in her journeys. I would describe her as the boss babe… She's the girl that's like… ‘I don't need to do whatever I'm told I need to do. I'm going to get it my way.’ I love that about her. It reminds me of me, and my own journey being in this industry, being tenacious and getting to my goals regardless of the opposition.”
For 15-year-old Akira Akbar, who made waves in 2019 as young Monica Rambeau in Captain Marvel and plays a socially-conscious Ashley Banks in Bel-Air, taking on the role meant trying to find a steady balance between honoring the original portrayal and bringing something new to the character — especially since the original series was before her time.
“This is my first time playing a character that was already a character before me,” says Akbar. “And so I just want to be able to portray her in a way that people don't think that she's totally different… I didn't want to study Ashley episode by episode, because I didn't want to be totally like her, but I also wanted to have my own spin on her.”
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According to the actors, refining this balance was one of the most challenging, crucial — and at times, exciting — aspects of the project.
"I'm following the legacy of Alfonso Ribeiro and the incredible character that he created, but also, I found the freedom to explore a different aspect of Carlton,” Sholotan says. “So I'm not chasing a performance, I'm not chasing any of those moments. We might as well be playing two different characters that share the same name.”
One thing that each actor is adamant to underscore is the fact that Bel-Air is not a reboot — it’s a spirited new chapter in the Fresh Prince saga. It’s an evolution of the story that fully stands on its own. “Art reflects culture,” Sholotan articulates. “[Today,] people are more concerned with social justice and more concerned with issues of privilege and how that relates to our skin color and our gender and race and sex. I think it's really important to have a TV show that talks about that and to have a TV show that experiences the world the same way people do.”
Though Bel-Air hopes to break new ground in the realm of Black storytelling, there is a collective commitment among the cast and crew to honor and respect the source material.
“We [say], every day on set, we're standing on the shoulders of giants,” the Nigerian-American actor notes. “We are stepping into a really important and very impactful legacy, but you have the choice. We all have the choice to either run from that or step up to it. I've chosen to wear it as a badge of honor.”
For Cooper, adapting his short film to a more wide-reaching project has been an “incredible” experience, formed from teamwork with the shared dream of creating something larger than themselves. “It's been a lot of work, but because we had the short as a north star that encompassed all of the organizing principles of our show, from the tone, to the look, to the sound, to the textures, it made the process so much easier,” Cooper says over email. “Working with partners that have been so supportive of that vision while bringing their own sensibilities and talent to the project, we were able to create something that we were ultimately all really proud of. This show came from a place of passion and wanting to make something meaningful to the culture. It's been quite a journey, but I wouldn't change anything about it.”
Olly explains that the entire cast practices a sort of alchemy with the pressure of the first show's legacy, turning that frantic, intimidating energy into motivation to do great work. According to Akira and Coco, the cast organically built a tight-knit family dynamic. Group chats, birthday parties, jam sessions, and hangouts after 14-hour set days resulted in a rich, rare connection. “You can tell that everybody's just so grateful to be there,” says Coco. “Every take you can't help but be like, ‘Damn, you're like me, I relate to you. You want to do well, you're happy to be here. You're putting your heart and soul into this. I am, too.’”
Each actor similarly compares the Bel-Air experience to a whirlwind, a fast-paced journey of lessons that has yet to slow down. Carlton has taught Sholotan about compassion, while Will has taught Banks about empathy. As they continue to film the second half of season one, each young member of the cast has their own vision of what kind of impact they hope the show will have.
“I hope that [viewers] walk away loving on themselves and their family,” reflects Banks. “But also the communication aspect… to be able to open up these conversations in our community. [I’m] hoping that they could take away from Will, the individuality of it, hoping that they can be authentically themselves. I hope that they see that in me. I hope that they see that in my story, and I hope that they see that in Will. There's like three layers to everything that I'm doing here.”
Banks wants Bel-Air to jolt the ways in which the Black community communicates with one another. He wants Will’s exploration of his identity to spark a wave of self-acceptance and self-love. Ultimately, he wants transformation… that flipped, turned-upside-down kind of change.
Editor-in-Chief: Versha Sharma
Photographer: Erik Carter
Photo Assistant: Nicol Biesek
Photo Assistant: JJ Geiger
Stylist: Savannah White
Stylist Assistant: Mauricio Gonzalez
Hair Stylist: Alexander Armand
Makeup Artist: Alana Wright
Makeup Assistant: Michael Silva
Props: Andre Shahjanian for Hype Creative LA
BTS Videographer: Skyler Bocciolatt
Video Editor: Canon Brownell
Production: Hyperion
Art Director: Emily Zirimis
Visual Editor: Louisiana Gelpi
Designer: Liz Coulbourn
Executive Editor: Dani Kwateng
Features Director: Brittney Mcnamara
Sr. Fashion Editor: Tchesmeni Leonard
Sr. Entertainment Editor: Eugene Shevertalov
Sr. Culture Editor: P. Claire Dodson
Sr. Director of Creative Development: Mi-Anne Chan
Sr. Social Media Manager: Honestine Fraser
Social Media Manager: Ysenia Valdez
