By// Joyce E. Davis
Jada Pinkett-Smith gifted Angela Davis with something more meaningful than a documentary made in her honor. As a producer, she was able to gain access to previously undisclosed details of the activist’s life. “We were looking at a part of how the FBI catches up to Angela when she’s on the run,” remembers Pinkett-Smith of screening Free Angela and All Political Prisoners (out now) with Davis during the 2012 Toronto International Film Festival. “And she looked to me and said, ‘I never knew how they caught me.’ It just validated for me why this movie was so important. That for me was like, ‘Job well done.’”
Even before Pinkett-Smith’s bank account surpassed seven figures, she dreamed of sharing stories that laud the strength of women. “It’s not okay for people to dictate what you’re going to be because of how you look,” she says. “That’s one of the reasons I plan to do a lot more producing. I have more influence that way.” A common purpose— and affluence— connected Pinkett-Smith, 41, with hip-hop mogul Jay-Z to co-produce Free Angela. The acclaimed documentary chronicles the high stakes political activism and trial that catapulted Davis, then a 26-year-old philosophy professor, into a 1970s revolutionary icon.
TO READ MORE PICK UP THE NEW ISSUE OF JET MAGAZINE, ON SALE NOW!
