jada pinkett-smith Tagged Articles at Cinematical

If you have a girl between the ages of 4 and 12 in your life, chances are pretty good you've heard of American Girl. The wildly successful franchise has spawned a whole series of high-end dolls, doll clothes, doll furniture and accessories, books, cookbooks ... and, of course, movies. American Girls are enormously popular with both girls and parents seeking a wholesome alternative to the freakishly-thin Barbie doll image or the hooker-in-training look of those wretched Bratz dolls. As an added bonus, they encourage girls to learn a little history, without even realizing it .

The whole thing with American Girl is that each of the dolls comes from a different time period: there's Kristen, an immigrant girl from Sweden; Felicity, an American Revolution girl whose father is a Patriot, while her best friend's father is a Loyalist; Samantha, being raised by her wealthy grandmother in the 1920s, when women's suffrage and class difference were big issues; Molly, a girl whose father, a doctor, is off serving in the Second World War; Addy, who escapes slavery with her mother to search for her father and brother, and so on. Each doll has her own set of books: there's the intro book, the birthday book, the book where so-and-so learns a lesson, the Christmas book, and even a line of mystery books.

In a 60 Minutes profile on Sunday, Steve Kroft said that Will Smith and Jada Pinkett-Smith are widely considered to have one of the best marriages in Hollywood. On the one hand, this struck me as an exceedingly odd statement: where else but Hollywood would people think of assigning ratings to marriages, as though you could rank them? Think of all the married couples you know: which one has the "best" marriage? Which one is "second best"? Good Lord, who wants to have the 43rd best marriage in town? What a weird way to view an intimate relationship between two people.

On the other hand, the Smiths are a part of the Hollywood movie-making community (even though their home base is evidently far outside the city limits), and competition is a way of life. We have rankings for the best paid, most popular, hottest, lamest, ad infinitum, so why not a ranking of Hollywood's best marriages? Since none of us have access to their actual private lives, we'll have to base this on appearances rather than insider knowledge and, just to keep this as celebrity-based as possible, both partners must be show business performers. Finally, same-sex couples are eligible at the discretion of the voters.

We'll start off with four couples that appear to enjoy good marriages. Feel free to add your own suggestions in the comments.

Now that her husband has officially conquered the world (and then some), Jada Pinkett-Smith is looking to get things started behind the camera. Filmjerk reports Pinkett-Smith wrote and will direct her first feature film this coming fall, when production kicks off on The Human Contract. Though the film stars two male leads, hubby Will Smith will not be one of them. He will be exec producing, though, through his Overbrook Entertainment, alongside producing partner James Lassiter. The film will begin shooting in Los Angeles on November 12, and currently no studio or distributor has signed on. What's it about, you ask? Good question -- see if you can figure this one out ...

... From the Filmjerk description (because I'm not sure I can sum this thing up any better than they did): "... Julian Wright, a charming and mega-successful businessman who hides a secret from the rest of the world which tears his soul apart every day. With his personal life in shambles, Julian will find himself willing to travel down the rabbit hole, as it were, when he meets Michael Reed, a gorgeous stranger who entices Julian to forget his rigid corporate world and try a more bohemian lifestyle, a decision that will not only affect his own life but those of his boss and co-workers, as well as inspire his half-sister Rita to re-examine her life with her abusive husband." Hmmm, gorgeous strangers, bohemian lifestyles and abusive husbands always go well together, so I guess this one's got potential. No word on who's starring in the film, though I imagine we'll find out soon enough. And if Pinkett-Smith can direct the entire film as Niobe from the Matrix films, then that'd be wicked cool, eh?