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The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is a popular American sitcom that aired on NBC from September 10, 1990 to September 9, 1996 featuring Will Smith in a fish-out-of-water tale of a streetwise Philadelphia teenager sent to live with rich relatives in a Bel-Air mansion. His ways of living certainly do not fit to the ways that his relatives live in Bel-Air. A total of 148 episodes were produced over 6 seasons. The show is currently seen on many networks such as The N and Nick at Nite as well as being syndicated on local channels in many countries.

Theme song and opening sequence

The theme song was written by Will Smith and performed by DJ Jazzy Jeff & The Fresh Prince. Its full version was rarely used on the show, although DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince did record it as an unreleased B-side.<ref>DJ Jazzy Jeff & the Fresh Prince: B-Side Lyrics</ref> For the first few episodes of the show, stanzas one to three and stanzas six and seven were used; however, beginning with Episode #9 (titled "Someday Your Prince Will Be in Effect (2)"), only the first two and the last two stanzas of the song were used, so that episodes could be longer.

Seasons 1-2; 5-6 featured an instrumental version of the theme and stills from the episode for the closing credits. In Season 2, the music and stills were dropped and closing credits would almost always appear over bloopers and outtakes from that episode, the last time that happened was in Season 4's Season Finale; It lasted Seasons 2-4. The closing theme over episode clips returned Season 5 (airing in the reruns, because of NBC's change from traditional credits to the split screen credits currently employed by the network).

Cast and characters

See List of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air characters

Phillip Banks (James Avery) Also known as Uncle Phil, by Will, Phillip Banks is the seriousness of the household. Whenever something is lost or stolen, he always tries to blame Will for whatever has been done. This is expressed with other members of the family as well, especially in one episode, where a couple personal items go missing, and everybody thinks Will is the one. But later, it's revealed that Jazz did it all.

Vivian Banks (Janet Hubert/Daphne Maxwell Reid) As the mother of the family, Vivian Banks, or Aunt Viv, is the cool-natured one. Many times, she thinks that Phillip and she are becoming less social, or haven't been spending enough time together.

Will Smith (Will Smith) The main character of the show, Will Smith always has a joke to express towards somebody. Whether being Phillip's weight, or Carlton's height, Will always has something humorous to say.

Carlton Banks (Alfonso Ribeiro) Carlton Banks is the motivated member of the family who is serious about grades, and doing the right thing. However many times, he has strolled different ways, into getting trouble caused. He is refered to on the show as short, many times, by Will. And by Hiliary, is often refered to as a nerd.

Hillary Banks (Karyn Parsons) As the shopoholic of the family, she's always trying to squeeze money from Phillip, by either expressing herself emotionally, such as crying, or complimenting him. Hilliary is preppy, and thinks much of herself, such as being beautiful. But in reality, many people who talk to her think she acts very snooty.

Ashley Banks (Tatyana M. Ali) The teenager, Ashley, starts on the show as a cute girl who admires Will, and as the show progresses, she begins to develop symptoms of crushes and love for boys.

"Nicky" Banks (Ross Bagley) Nicky Banks (Full Name Nicholas Banks) does not come along until the final seasons. And in those seasons, he starts with being the tiny baby who everyone adores, to the young child who sparks creativity without even trying.

Geoffrey (Joseph Marcell) Geoffrey, known as "G" by Will, is the sarcastic butler who can make a joke about anything. As in one episode, where Phillip says he doesn't have much of an apetite, Geoffrey responds with, "Should I call 911?"

Running gags

In addition to humorous scripts, the show found humor in physical comedy, insults, and running gags:

• Carlton frequently bringing up Uncle Phil's will and suggestions for revisions to it.
• There have been a few jokes about the size of Will's ears. In one episode, they went to a barber shop and the barber stated "Now you know I'm gonna have to charge you extra for cuttin around these ears?" In another episode, Lisa makes a joke about them being cute.
• Will would frequently make jabs at Carlton's slight stature and virginity, as well as at Uncle Phil's weight and baldness. For Carlton's height, one episode held a small twist. In this episode, Will and Carlton trick Geoffrey into thinking he won the lottery. Humiliated and resentful, Geoffrey quits as the Banks' butler and takes a job as a waiter. At Geoffrey's new restaurant, Will and Carlton pretend to be his sons. Will then jokes that the reason Carlton, his "older brother", "stopped growing" was because they didn't have any money for clothes. Rather than getting upset or angry, Carlton makes fun of himself, saying he wants to grow.
• A running gag throughout the series was Carlton's enthusiastic love of singer Tom Jones and a gyrating dance he would perform to Jones' tune "It's Not Unusual." Eventually, Tom Jones guest-starred as himself as Carlton's guardian angel, showing Carlton what the Banks family would be like if he had never been born, à la It's A Wonderful Life.
• A favorite recurring gag throughout the series involved Will's best friend Jazz flying out the front door after saying something offensive to a member of the Banks family (usually Philip) and being physically thrown out by him or her. The shot of Jazz flying through the front door was only filmed once (for Season 1, Episode #2: "Bang the Drum, Ashley" when Phil told him to turn up a classical music record, and Jazz scratches it like a DJ) and re-used each time. For this reason, in the many later episodes in which he is thrown out the door, he is always wearing the same shirt as he was that first time. In the Season 2 episode "Cased up," there was a small twist on this gag: when Jazz offends Phillip outside on the Banks' driveway, then comments "You can't throw me out because I'm already outside," Phillip proceeds to pick him up and throw him into the house via the kitchen door. Another twist to this is in the Halloween episode in a dream of Will's where Hilary and Jazz fall in love, to which Philip tries to throw him out, but ends up being thrown out himself. Will was once thrown out of the house in the same manner as Jazz for making changes to his Uncle Phil's tape. In an episode, Jazz is thrown out together with a life-size cardboard figure of Bill Cosby - this one had to be redone several times, and such attempts appeared as the blooper sequence for the end of this episode.
• Another running gag is the frequent reference to the song "Apache" by The Sugar Hill Gang.
• Will constantly makes quick jokes about Uncle Phil's size and weight. At some points, even Geoffrey jokes about Uncle Phil's size.
• Another running gag is the times when one person is having a serious talk about their lives or relationship with another family member or lover, the other members of the family listen in and always trip or fall in the conversation.
• Throughout the series when various female characters are reunited (usually the Smith sisters, but also Hilary) they embrace, scream and jump in a giddy manner. This is then imitated by Will in a humerous way next to them.

Breaking of the Fourth Wall

The breaking of the fourth wall was a common gag on the show; some examples include:

• Will describing the character Omar as "the dude who be spinning me over his head during the opening credits" in the episode "The Philadelphia Story"
• Will voicing his confusion over how Nicky could have aged several years over a period of about three months; in that scene, Jazz breaks the wall as well by first asking if the same person was playing the mother (a reference to the change of actress in the Vivian role), then, upon seeing the older Nicky, says, "Man I'm going back to the street where things make sense."
• After Uncle Phil proclaims, "We're rich," Will asks the audience, "If we so rich, why we can't afford no ceiling?" while the camera tilts up to show the studio lights and rafters and the audience burst into laughter.
• In another episode, Will fakes playing the saxophone while Branford Marsalis plays in the background, causing Will to quip how great it is to be working for NBC.
• The entire blooper episode (the anniversary episode) breaks the fourth wall.
• Philip is complaining until Will takes a television remote and "clicks off" Philip, then asks the studio audience if they wish they could live on television like him, where such things are possible.
• Both Will and Carlton break the fourth wall in a later episode: Will meets his eventual girlfriend Lisa at ULA, where she poses as a psychopath obsessed with Will. As a practical joke, Will later tells Carlton that Lisa was really insane and that he had to kill her in self-defense. Carlton goes into a frenzied grief, running through all the set pieces (the house, the university, the cabin where Lisa entrapped Will, etc.), eventually meeting Will as the camera pans away from the set and into the audience.
• After Will's decision to stay with his mother in Philadelphia at the end of the episode "The Philadelphia Story", some NBC execs come into his workplace and grab Will with the intention of bringing him back to Bel-Air in the season 5 premiere, explaining that they cast him as the "Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, not the Fresh Prince of Philadelphia." The NBC exec humorously quotes the theme song: "Yo, homes, to Bel-Air" as they throw Will into a truck with the NBC logo and the words "Star Retrieval Unit".
• In another episode, Will is reading in his horoscope that he will become a rap star with his own TV show. Hilary scoffs at this and at her horoscope, that says she will have a great fall. When that comes true, Will wonders what his show should be called and smiles at the audience.
• In the episode where Will gets a starring role in a live soap opera, Uncle Phil says something along the lines of, "Yeah, like they are going to give a rapper with no acting experience what so ever a starring role on a network television show." Will then looks at the camera and replies, "It could happen."
• In one episode, Will adresses a judge with his opening statement (Uncle Phil takes Will and Carlton to mock-court over the rent for the pool-house) "I'm from West Philidelphia, born and raised". He then continued to say "On the playground is where I spent most of my days".
• In one episode Will, Carlton and Ashley are playing a game with a dart gun, Geoffrey gets shot and everybody believes that Will did it, looking for the shooter he goes out to the backyard and not finding anybody he asks the cameraman "you believe me right?" and the camera shakes confirming yes and then shoots him confirming he isn't the shooter.
• In another episode, Will steals Carlton's ex-girlfriend and while trying to convince Carlton that he helped him, he turns around and says "I can't see him, is he buyin' it?" to the audience.
• On one episode, Uncle Phil states to his wife "Vivian, you are so naive. You would believe Will if he told you that he were some big rap star, whose album just went platinum." which in actuality that year he really did.
• In multiple episodes, Will will either talk or just look at the camera. For example, after Will burns down the kitchen in "Burnin' Down the House," he swings his arms while looking at the camera and yelling "Mama, No!"
• In one episode, Will overhears his aunt's boyfriend on the phone thinking he has a secret girlfriend. Will reacts as he confronts him and ask why cheat on his aunt. The boyfriend says it's his shrink (which we learn it really is). Will replys "Oh yeah, and I just won a Grammy" which Will Smith actually won.
• In one episode, after Will won a basketball game, he turned to the camera and shouted "I'm going to Disneyland!"
• In one episode, when Jazz sets Will on a date with his sister and at dinner, she turns out to be controlling, Will looks up at the camera with his mouth hanging. Then Jazz's sister asks, "William, who are you looking at?!"
• In the episode "Cased Up", guest star Malcolm-Jamal Warner remakes that he thought the whole family gathered around the table for dinner "only happened on The Cosby Show," referncing the show on which he was a main character.

Issues addressed

While the show addressed many serious issues, a few episodes were often lauded as "very special episodes". Many of these did not have bloopers during the credits, to maintain the seriousness of the show.

• While largely a comedy, this show commonly addressed African American issues. In the very first episode, for instance, Will accuses his uncle of forgetting "who you are and where you came from," or having forgotten that he is black, even going as far by saying he's gone soft. His uncle (himself a former Civil Rights activist) is furious, and points out Will's frequently-mentioned belief in the philosophy of Malcolm X. "I heard the brother speak, I know where I came from," Phil angrily informs his nephew. Also, Will accuses Geoffrey of "acting like we still on the plantation."

• The concept of what is acceptable for black self-expression was addressed in an episode where Philip clashes with Will over his attire at a party, which Philip feels make Will look like a hoodlum. Will compares his hoodlum attire to Philip's Afro from when he was a Civil Rights activist, to which Philip angrily explains "I was making a statement. You're just drawing attention to yourself." Will responds by asking how it's possible that a man as large as Philip "with an Afro the size of Philly" is not drawing attention to himself (Philip resolves this by grounding his own children, which turns them against Will and pressures him to change his attire).
• In another episode, Will and Carlton try to join an all-black fraternity, but Carlton is rejected on the grounds that the "Top Dog" believes that Carlton is not someone he thinks should be part of the fraternity and that he is a "sell-out" (being from a rich family, dresses in "Ralph Lauren Shirts", lives in a big house and has a butler that does things for him). Carlton proceeds to stand up for himself to the "Top Dog," saying that being black isn't what Carlton is trying to be, but what he is, and that Top Dog is the real sell-out for not knowing what it truly means to "stick together."
• In one episode Will complains that blacks are always shown rapping and dancing whenever they're shown on TV.
• In another early episode, Will and Carlton are delivering an expensive car to one of Phillip's white colleagues, Henry Firth, but are accused by the police of stealing it only because they are black. They are jailed, the police refuse to listen to Vivian or Philip in which Firth himself appears and confirms them to be his partner's (Philip) son and nephew. Philip then threatens the department with legal action, forcing the police to release them. At the end of the episode, Phil says that "he wondered the same thing when he had first gotten stopped", after Carlton asked him if he would pull him over for driving slowly.

• In one episode, Will and one of his old school friends, Ice Tray, reminisce about how Ice Tray frequently had to save Will from bullies who attacked him because he tried to be a good student. When Vivian confronts Will about Ice Tray's lack of drive, and challenges the assumption by Will that he and Ice Tray are alike, Will mentions that Ice Tray never had anyone to stick up for him, and by defending Will he kept Will from spiraling down the wrong path.
• In an episode where Will is shot in the back during an attempted robbery at a bank ATM and then hospitalized, Carlton finds himself pondering the idea of carrying a gun for self-defense. This leads to an emotional confrontation between the two.
• The issue of absent fathers was touched upon when Will finally meets his father Lou (played by Ben Vereen) in one of the series' more emotional episodes. While Will was still an infant, his jobless father had one day walked out "to get a pack of smokes" and never came home. Years later he returns, now employed as a trucker, while Will is in college. Philip and Vivian give Lou the cold shoulder, but Will decides that he wants to go on the road with his father and leave Bel-Air for the summer, which Philip at first forbids. Will angrily retorts that Phil was not his father which upsets Phil. However, his father abandons him yet again, and the episode concludes with Will hugging Philip in tears, asking, "How come he don't want me, man?" Symbolically, Will accepts the fact that his Uncle Phil is the closest thing to a true father he has ever had. The series finale includes Phil's proudly declaring to Will "You are my son," after seemingly repudiating him for much of the show's run.
• The issue of teenage pregnancy is brought up in the episode "Be My Baby Tonight", in which Ashley is curious about sex. Will and Carlton, determined to find a way to talk to Ashley about it, go down to the local pregnancy center and find out about the issues.
• The issue of interracial marriage is addressed in an episode in which one of Vivian's sisters, Janice, announces her engagement to a white man, Frank (played by Diedrich Bader), and Will's mother at first forbids this. Will doesn't have any problem with this, and defies his mother's authority when he goes to the wedding anyway. The episode ends with Will's mother accepting the marriage.
• Drug abuse is addressed in an episode in which Will, busy with finals, basketball, and his girlfriend, is having trouble staying awake. When one of Will's classmates gives him some amphetamines to help him stay up, Carlton takes 2000 milligrams of amphetamines, which he presumes to be vitamin E pills to get rid of a pimple. After Carlton's near-fatal overdose, Will confesses that although he never used the drugs, he is to blame for Carlton's using them.
• The issue of alcohol abuse and drunk driving is explored as well. While at a party, Will and a rival drink shots to see who can drink the most. When Will passes out from drinking so much, some bullies drop him off at a graveyard and he meets spirits of the dead, who are stuck playing an eternal game of poker. While the poker sequence is shown humorously, the mood gets somber when a ghost child (who was with the other spirits) tells Will, "I was outside playing ball on the street, then a car came, jumped the sidewalk, and took me out. The driver was drunk."
• The issue of divorce is also talked about. In a two-part episode in the sixth and final season, Phil and Vivian consider getting a divorce after Phil lies to Vivian about running for superior court judge.

DVD Releases

List of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air episodes

Season Releases

DVD Name	Ep #	Release dates			DVD Extras
		Region 1	Region 2	Region 4
The Complete 1st</sup> Season	25	February 8 2005	February 21 2005	April 13 2005	"Back-to-Bel-Air: A Fresh Look" featurette.
The Complete 2nd</sup> Season	24	October 11 2005	November 21 2005	March 1 2006	Best Bits of Bel Air, and Bloopers from Season 2.
The Complete 3rd</sup> Season	24	February 14 2006	June 26 2006	August 9 2006	Best of the Upper Bel-Air Crust (Season 3 highlights), and Bloopers from Season 3.
The Complete 4th</sup> Season	26	August 8 2006	January 22, 2007	[December 6] [2006]	No Bonus Features.
The Complete 5th</sup> Season	25	February, 2007	N/A	N/A	N/A
The Complete 6th</sup> Season	24	September, 2007	N/A	N/A	N/A

The first season has a special features section which features the creators, Tatyana Ali, Joseph Marcell and James Avery in a brief documentary. Tatyana Ali says the show is funny and she will never experience anything like it again. James Avery mentioned that he enjoyed it a lot and misses it. The second season has a special features section which plays through an archive of the season's bloopers and the best parts.

It should be noted that whilst season 1 had excellent special features (cast interview), seasons 2 and 3 have been severely lacking in this department, due to simply running through the bloopers which can be seen at the end of each individual show. Despite the show launching Will Smith's career, he has neglected its DVD releases by not appearing in the 'special features' a single time (up to season 4).

Errors

• The show contains a few continuity errors, in that some characters seem to age at different rates. In episode #2, "Bang the Drum Ashley," Ashley says she is 9; later in that season, in "Just Infatuation," Phil says she is almost 12. Also, in the season 2 premiere, which was a few months after Ashley's 12th birthday, she becomes 13. Will is 17 for the first two seasons, and 18 in season three. Nicky Banks grows from baby to preschooler between seasons four and five (though this was humorously addressed).

• In one episode in Season Two, the family is going to an awards show and is to be sat next to Arnold Schwarzenegger. Eventually there is a power cut, and Phil and Vivian are trapped in Phil's office. Uncle Phil then turns on the stereo to make things a bit more romantic, even though using a stereo would be impossible during a power cut (This is also mentioned on a montage in the Special Features on the DVD release of the series).

• Another continuity error involves the marriage of Vy to Lisa's father Fred Wilkes. The two are married in the fifth season finale "For Whom the Wedding Bells Toll," but when Vy visits the Banks house in season six's "There's the Rub," she arrives without Fred.

• Another continuity error occurs when Will claims he's never met his father in the episode where Carlton gets depressed and runs away to a blues bar (B.B. King guest stars as a guitarist at the bar), but earlier, when his father, Lou Smith, meets Will at his job at 'The Peacock' and Will knows who he is because he has a vague memory of him, and claims he hadn't seen him in fourteen years.

• When Will and Carlton appear on a game show, the announcer states that Carlton was born and raised in Bel-Air. Although in later episodes the Banks family is portrayed as living in a ghetto before Ashley is born.

• In the episode in which Will is thrown out of the house by Philip because of his beeper/hat/hair/clothes/etc., Will meets a dog and tells him that he never had a dog before. However, in a later episode, Will says, "I'm responsible! .... I had a puppy!", although he is intoxicated.

Syndication

The series currently airs seven nights a week on Nick at Nite and The N. On Nick at Nite, Fresh Prince is on at 10:30 PM and 12:30 AM ET. Also on Sunday and Monday nights there is a non-stop marathon from 12:00-4:00 AM/ET.

On The N, (Noggin's nighttime program lineup) broadcast with scenes that were deleted from syndicated and original broadcasts of the series. The series is also syndicated in some U.S. markets, used by some (such as KAUT 43 in Oklahoma City) as filler programming. It also airs in Canada on YTV nightly and Omni 2. In the UK, it airs on Flextech channels Trouble and Bravo, and had a regular weekday slot on BBC Two, though now it is rarely found in schedules. In Australia, it airs on the Nine Network (free-to-air) and on Nickelodeon (cable/satellite). In Holland, Fresh Prince airs Monday through Friday on Veronica. In Brazil airs Monday through Saturday on SBT with the name "Um Maluco no Pedaço". In Norway, the show is broadcasted by TVNorge on weekdays with the Norwegian title "Fresh Prince i Bel Air". [1]. In New Zealand, the show screens on weekdays on Prime. The show was a big hit with Arabic speaking viewers when it became among the early western shows to air on MBC around the late 90's and early 2000's and was among one of MBC's most reruned shows although it has yet to air on MBC 4 since the network began launching seperate channels.

Trivia

• Although Bel-Air is not an independent town, the show treated it as such, with references to the Bel-Air Academy, a "Bank of Bel-Air", and even the theme song's lyric: "I'll tell you how I became the prince of a town called Bel-Air" [2]
• Some viewers thought they saw George Burns playing a character named Max in the episode in which Will has a fear of surgery. The role was actually played by legendary actor and comedian Milton Berle, who quite resembled Burns at the time.
• Before playing Lisa Wilkes, Nia Long had previously appeared as Claudia, Will's date to a dance in the first-season episode "She Ain't Heavy." In addition, Long and Smith appeared together in 1992's Made in America with Ted Danson and Whoopi Goldberg.
• The show was originally supposed to end in Spring 1994 due to Will Smith's desire to venture off into other projects hence the series finale ending for the season. After the episode was taped in March, Smith told producers after fan reaction he wanted to continue on with the series.
• Queen Latifah once played Will's date to a dance in the second season but in the first was a snobby 40-year-old actor who likes Will.
• Will Smith announced before the sixth season even started taping that it would be his last season on the show as he wanted to focus on his film career and he wanted to record an album and he didn't think he would have enough time to do all three at the same time.
• Janet Hubert-Whitten left the show over contract issues and creative differences with Will Smith, who by the last season was the executive producer of the show. Daphne Maxwell-Reid was her replacement. Many fans point to this cast change as the moment when the show "jumped the shark."
• In some episodes Will makes a number of Muhammad Ali references. Years later, Smith portrayed Muhammad Ali in a motion picture entitled Ali.
• In another episode, Will makes a reference to Chicken George, a character in the miniseries Roots who was played by Ben Vereen. In the episode "Papa's Got a Brand New Excuse," Will's father is played by Vereen.
• In the 1996 film Independence Day, Will Smith's character has a girlfriend, played by Vivica A. Fox, whose son is portrayed by Ross Bagley. Fox also played Jazz's sister and Will's date in one episode. Additionally, Bagley played the older version of Will's cousin, Nicky.
• In the 1994-95 season finale episode "For Whom the Wedding Bells Toll", Lisa reveals her real first name is Beulah. The Minister at the wedding says her full name "Beulah Lisa Wilkes."
• Lisa Wilkes nor her father Fred is seen again after the 1994-95 season.
• Although during earlier seasons Janet Hubert-Whitten (Vivian Banks) played the mother of Karyn Parsons (Hillary Banks) she is only 10 years older than her in real life.
• Every time Jazz gets thrown out of the house, he wears the same shirt. (This is due to the fact that the scene was only filmed once, and reused throughout the series)
• The Banks's apparently had a dog named Fifi, that only appeared in the opening video to one episode. Carlton also mentions another dog, Scruffy, when trying to console Hilary after Trevor died. He mentions that Trevor is "up there, with my old dog Scruffy".
• Since Fred Wilkes, Lisa's dad, married Vi Smith, Will's mom, Will and Lisa are siblings by law. In Boyz N The Hood, Nia Long starred as a girlfriend of Cuba Gooding Jr.'s character, Tre, named Cindy. In one scene, Tre quotes that his dad has a crush on Cindy's mom and if they get married, Tre and Cindy would be siblings, just like Will and Lisa in that episode.
• The show has been featured in a recent internet meme. A popular joke on message boards is to create a thread dealing with something horrific or shocking, but then breaking into the show's theme song near the end to reveal it was all a joke (i.e. "After I had finished burying the man I found my mom standing behind me and she got scared and said "You're moving with your Auntie and Uncle in Bel-Air!").
• In Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice for All, a clown named Moe often breaks into a "clown-revised" version of the theme song.
• The very last words spoken in the series are said by Will to himself when he says, "I am definitely gonna miss you C," referring to Carlton.
• Will Smith worked with both models Naomi Campbell and Tyra Banks on his show. Tyra Banks and Naomi Campbell had problems with each other.
• Naomi Campbel plays a British nanny whom Geoffrey dates and who Will is interested in, in a later episode when Ashley is pursuing a modelling career, Will humerously asks the secretary at the modelling agency "Naomi wouldn't happen to be around, would she?"
• In the episode, "The Philidelphia Story" Will is seen re-enactng the training scenes from the original Rocky movie, most of them ending up with humurous results including Carlton being rendered unconsciuous when Will accidentally punched them while they were training in a meat locker along with the end of the parody where Will falls over from exhaustion after completing the famous stair climb (he is subsequently mugged). The theme for the training scene in the original Rocky, Gonna Fly Now, can be heard playing in the background.