After Will Smith inadvertently channeled the likeness of his late Uncle Phil, the internet has been murmuring with a renewed interest for the legendary ’90s sitcom, The Fresh Prince Of Bel-Air.
Taking to Instagram, Alfonso Ribeiro (a.k.a. Carlton Banks) gave the fans something to cherish with heart likes by reuniting Tatyana Ali (Ashley), Karyn Parsons (Hilary), Daphne Maxwell Reid (The Second Aunt Viv, 1993-1996) and Joseph Marcell (Geoffrey the Butler).
“Always amazing to spend an afternoon with my Fresh Prince family. Wishing that James Avery was still with us to make this complete,” Ribeiro captioned the pic.
Avery passed away at the age of 68 on December 31, 2013, following complications after open-heart surgery.
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As for Janet Hubert (a.k.a. The First Aunt Viv), her presence in the show from its inception in 1990 all the way to the tail end of Season 3 in 1993 will always be appreciated in the minds of Day 1 viewers but that doesn’t mean her legacy was. She was reportedly feuding with Smith throughout the duration of her tenure on the NBC hit show and was either fired or chose to walk (depending on who you ask) at the close of the aforementioned Season 3.
Ever since the dawn of social media, Hubert has been fairly transparent that she and Smith never made amends. Most recently, the backstory beef resurfaced during the 2016 Oscar blitz around the time Jada Pinkett Smith made a fuss over her husband’s supposed snub for his portrayal as Dr. Bennet Omalu in the sports drama, Concussion.
During a February 2016 appearance on The Real, Hubert explained how she tried to get her name cleared from being the black sheep of the otherwise flawless reputation the show holds in regard to history.
“I went back to them in 2009 I and said, ‘Please, I need you to clear my name,'” she told the cast before explaining that she was only in communication with Will Smith’s manager, James Lassiter.
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“I spoke to J.L. when my dad died and my brother died, and I begged them. I said, ‘I have a family. I need you to tell the world that this stuff didn’t happen,'” she recalled. “And I was waiting in my heart, thinking somebody would come to me one day and help me, but they didn’t. Because I had been trained as a young woman, you always have you dignity … but I realized that redemption was not gonna come unless I did it myself.”
Aside from Hubert’s saga, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air cast remains one of the most tight-knit television families around, as they generally have supported one another’s endeavors well past the show’s end.
