-Welcome back, everyone.
We're hanging out with Will Smith right here!
[ Cheers and applause ]
I want to talk about "King -- King Richard."
-"King Richard," yeah.
-You're amazing in this movie,
and you're getting a lot of good buzz on this.
Congrats. Well deserved. -Thank you.
-But this is not the first time you're playing a real person.
-Yeah. -Is that extra pressure?
-It is terrifying when you play a real person
that is still alive and you know that they're going to see it.
You know? -Yeah.
-And it was beautiful.
Venus and Serena were really excited about the possibility.
And they said that, you know, they would potentially be
executive producers and they would walk us
through the whole process, but they were going to withhold
whether or not they put their names on the film
until they saw it.
So then I get the call that Venus and Serena are walking
into the theater to see the film.
And it's like -- it's the worst two hours ever.
[ Laughter ] It's the worst two hours.
-"Please think I did a good job."
-'Cause you spend so much time creating these things
and there is literally only one audience when you do it.
I did it, you know, with Muhammad Ali.
And then with "Pursuit of Happyness" and "Concussion"
with people that were all alive. -Yes.
-And it's just -- it's the only audience.
And you just hope to God that, you know,
you've spent a year to tell this story.
-Doing the right thing. -And you hope that they like it.
And Venus and Serena cried all the way through
and they loved it. -Loved it, yeah.
One point that I heard that they thought, like,
it looked and sounded just like their dad.
-Their dad. Yeah, yeah.
-That they were like, "This is creepy."
It's like real. "It's, like, freaking me out."
Like, "This is not real. It's a movie."
-Yeah. What was really interesting to me is that,
you know, we all feel like we have a picture of
Richard Williams,
and it's the classic overbearing father hammering his children.
But in sitting with Venus and Serena
and their sisters and their mother,
it was completely the opposite.
He was a loving, caring, doting father.
Venus referred to it as the Jedi mind trick,
that he had somehow made it so they would have to ask him,
"Please, Daddy, can we play tennis?"
Their punishment would be that they couldn't play tennis
when they got in trouble.
And it was -- You know, he aligned with what they wanted
for themselves more than demanding
what he wanted for them. -Yeah.
-And it was a real lesson for me as a parent, you know,
recognizing that you want to be in alignment with your kids
versus forcing and pushing and demanding.
-Telling them what to do, yeah. -Telling them what to do.
It was a beautiful family story.
It was beautiful. -I want to show everyone a clip.
Here's Will Smith in "King Richard."
Take a look at this.
-I'm very confident.
-You say it so easily.
Why?
-Because I believe it.
-But you haven't played a match in almost three years.
-Alright, hold it right there, if you don't mind.
Let me tell you why.
-Richard, we're doing an interview.
-What -- What she had said, she said it with so much confidence
the first time, but you keep going on and on.
-But you can't just keep interrupting if we're --
-What you got to understand is you are dealing with the image
of a 14-year-old child.
And this child going to be playing when your old ass and me
going to be in the grave.
When she had said something, we done told you what's happening.
You are dealing with a little black kid.
Let her be a kid.
Now, she done answered it with a lot of confidence.
Leave that alone!
[ Cheers and applause ] -Whoa.
-That's how you do it!
Will Smith, everybody!
"King Richard" is in theaters and streaming on HBO Max
starting next Friday.
And his book, "Will," is available now.