Another episode of Red Table Talk about relationships, which is well worth the investment of time. Award-winning rapper, Wale, and Jane the Virgin star, Justin Baldoni, join Jada Pinkett-Smith, her mother, Adrienne Banfield-Norris, and daughter, Willow Smith, at the Red Table for another vulnerable, eye-opening, and honest conversation about relationships — this time, about what men want and need in the search for true love.
“I want a woman to show me what I want in a woman,” declares Wale in the opening minutes. “I believe their intuition is stronger than men’s.”
Let’s just say that he didn’t get very far with that obfuscation before being interrupted by Jada and Willow, who question whether his answer is a cop-out.
“So you want a woman to be the unlocker of your soul?” 18 year-old Willow asks skeptically.
Wale, known through his music for grappling with the treacherous journey of finding “the one,” quickly realizes that the conversation dive at this table is going to be deep. Thereafter, he is forthcoming on where he is currently on his journey, as is Baldoni, who has been successfully married for several years.
Interestingly, Baldoni attributes what he thinks has been the best description of marriage he’s ever received, which came from a friend:
“Marriage is two people that take a lifetime full of shit — like you bring your 25 bags of shit, and the other person brings their 25 bags — and you put it all in the front yard. And that becomes the foundation for your house; it becomes the fertilizer from which your marriage can grow. But we’re not trained to think about it that way.”
By the end of their Red Table encounter, Wale declares, “This is like going to a shrink — on camera.”
Totally true.
Especially when Willow — who continues to defy her tender age with the truisms that come from her soul — delivers her parting shot.
“It’s like climbing a mountain,” she womansplains to Wale. “Do the work, then you see the beauty.”
Brilliant.
