At one point, Kotb asked the former “Red Table Talk” host to address rumors about her 26-year marriage with “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” actor.
“You and Will probably have more rumors about you and talk about you than others,” Kotb said as Pinkett Smith laughed.
“‘They’re in an open marriage, they’re swingers, he’s gay, she’s gay.’ I mean a million things were out there,” Kotb continued.
Kotb then asked: “What, if anything, is true and did hearing all that stuff bother you?”
“No,” Pinkett Smith responded.
Jada said she and Will won’t divorce anytime soon because they “don’t want to.” Jordan Strauss/Invision/AP
“You know, that’s part of it. I would say that none of that’s true. I definitely can understand why there’d be misunderstandings,” she added. “But none of it’s true.”
In a 2020 episode of her Facebook show, “Red Table Talk,” Pinkett Smith stated that she was “infatuated” with a woman on two occasions in her early 20s but did not pursue them romantically.
“I love being amongst women, but I never could connect to women romantically,” she said at the time. “But that’s not to say that it couldn’t be. You just never know.”
Meanwhile, in his 2021 memoir, Smith wrote that before he and Pinkett Smith married in 1997, she shared her doubts about “the viability of monogamy as a framework for successful long-term relationships.”
While promoting the book, Smith told GQ in September 2021 that for a “large part” of their relationship, they chose to be monogamous but “have given each other trust and freedom” and confirmed they both engaged in “other sexual relationships.”
In the NBC News interview, Pinkett Smith confirmed that she and Smith have no plans to divorce anytime soon.
“We don’t want to,” Pinkett Smith said plainly when asked why she and Smith haven’t filed for divorce if they’ve been living separately for so long.
Pressed by Kotb to explain further, she added: “Because we love our family and we love each other. You know, it’s more of a life partnership.”
“Now 10 years from now, Hoda? Who knows,” Pinkett continued.
Asked if either one of them getting into a different romantic relationship would change this, Pinkett Smith said that the couple isn’t concerned about pursuing romance.
“Right now, what we’re focused on, which has been so beautiful, is deep healing,” she said. “Because of everything’s that transpired. Now what happens after that I don’t know yet.”
Representatives for the Smiths did not respond to Insider’s request for further comment made outside regular working hours.
Correction: October 14, 2023 — An earlier version of this story misspelled Hoda Kotb’s name. It is Hoda Kotb not Hoda Kobt.
