Will Smith had sweet words of encouragement for his own Bad Boys: Ride or Die Costa Vanessa Hudgens when filming got complicated in the middle of her pregnancy.
Filming on the fourth installment of the action-comedy franchise began in March 2023, but was halted during the SAG-AFTRA actors’ strike, which lasted 118 days from July to November 2023.
Hudgens, 35, debuted her baby bump at the 2024 Academy Awards in March, and Smith, 55, said Party tonight that when recording resumed on Drive or die after the strike, her baby bump presented a bit of a challenge.
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Will Smith attends a photo call for Sony’s ‘Bad Boys: Ride or Die’ on May 17, 2024.
Kevin Winter/Getty
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“So the strike happened [and] when she came back and we had to finish the film, it was real [about] trying to figure out how to shoot around [the bump]”the Men in Black said the star.
Smith praised High school musical alum, who plays weapons expert Kelly in the franchise, as a “hard worker.”
Everything you need to know Bad Boys 4
He said he offered Hudgens words of encouragement when the stunts proved challenging due to her pregnancy.
“I said, ‘No, don’t worry. You’ll always be able to tell your kid that he was in this scene with you,'” Smith said ET.
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Vanessa Hudgens attends the 2024 Vanity Fair Oscar Party hosted by Radhika Jones.
Taylor Hill/Getty
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Hudgens is expecting her first child with her husband, baseball player Cole Tucker, whom she married in December 2023.
The Princess Switch star recently said Stare why she decided to skip Coachella for the second year in a row.
– Walking is aggressive. There is a lot of walking – the future mother admitted.
Bad Boys: Ride or Die arrives in theaters on June 7.
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