Like any good father, Will Smith proudly embarrassed his son Jaden by re-enacting the 19-year-old’s “Icon” music video.
Smith posted his recreation Tuesday to congratulate Jaden on his debut studio album “Syre,” which has reached 100 million Spotify streams.
With purple skies, gold chains, a rugged jean jacket and similar camerawork, Will staged his video like for like with Jaden’s, which hit YouTube on Nov. 17, 2017 — the same day as the full album release. Smith spoofs the ridiculous hip-hop glamour of his son’s video by loosely following Jaden’s movements and gestures with a goofy grilled-up smile and awkward dance moves in slippers.
At the end of the video, Smith voices his congratulations to Jaden. “I’m proud of you baby,” Smith said. “100 million streams. Congratulations man. I love you.”
Is the line, “all your verses sound like dirty dishes, I’m about to clean ’em in the kitchen,” something to be proud of, though? And it might not be the best sign that Jaden’s songs deviate from Will’s squeaky clean profile during his rapping days with lyrics like, “your s**t is fire I’m more, so what, young Jaden dyin’ on the floor, so what.”
This is all up for debate, but there’s no denying the impressive success of the album as a whole, which peaked at No. 24 on the Billboard 200.
Jaden took the parody well, commenting on the video: “Dad this is the funniest thing I’ve ever seen in my life. You’re the best father anyone could ask for. Thank you for allowing me to express myself even when I take it too far sometimes. I love you more than you will ever know because you taught me how to love. Also, thank you for having the best Instagram on planet Earth.”