Jada Pinkett

Actress Jada Pinkett Smith, who learned her craft at the Baltimore School for the Arts before launching a successful film and television career, is donating $1 million to a major renovation and expansion campaign at the school, officials announced yesterday. The School for the Arts, considered one of the top public arts high schools in the country, plans to name its new theater the Jada Pinkett Smith Theater. At Pinkett Smith's request, the theater will be dedicated to rapper Tupac Shakur, a former classmate who was shot and killed in 1996.

NEW YORK - Instead of strutting in stilettos, they bounced in saddle shoes. No, these were not the usual models seen on the runways of Fashion Week, except for the labels on the clothes they were wearing: Escada, Hilfiger, Sean John, Kenneth Cole, Nicole Miller. Those were some of the designers showing their fall lines here yesterday - for 4- to 11-year-olds. Call it high fashion for the knee-high set, the kind of cashmere blazers, leather jackets and faux furs that trendy moms and dads wear, miniaturized for their offspring.

THE ARTS ARE LIKE A MIXED BED OF VEGetables and flowers. Not only are they a delight to the senses, they are chock full of stuff that's good for you. And, by most measures, Maryland in 2006 produced a plentiful harvest.

Baltimore native Jada Pinkett Smith and her husband, Will, are expecting Michelle Obama over for lunch -- and some other very fancy guests. The Smiths are opening their home in Calabasas, Calif., on Oct. 25 for an Obama fundraiser that the first lady will attend. Also expected to be there are co-host Salma Hayek and Lady Gaga manager Troy Carter. According to The Hollywood Reporter , it will cost people $2,500 just to get in the door, and $10,000 per couple to have a photo snapped with Michelle Obama.

Actress Jada Pinkett Smith is appealing directly to Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake on behalf of elephants. In a letter dated Tuesday, the actress said she was appealing to the mayor "as a mother and proud Baltimore native. " Pinkett Smith wanted to make sure no elephants were jabbed with bullhooks during the upcoming performance of Ringling Bros. Circus' at 1st Mariner Arena. She reminded Rawlings-Blake of the city's law against any “mechanical, electrical, or manualdevice that is likely to cause physical injury or suffering” to a performing animal.

For weeks the media has feasted on a Jada Pinkett Smith comment that implied she and her husband Will enjoy an open marriage. So she took to Facebook this week to put an end to the feeding frenzy. Or maybe to throw out another bone. "Open marriage?" she wrote.  "Let me first say this, there are far more important things to talk about in regards to what is happening in the world than whether I have an open marriage or not. " True that. But, hey, no harm in chatting about it, just a little, all the same.

Actress and Baltimore native Jada Pinkett Smith took to Facebook to condemn the media for "bullying" Justin Bieber and other young artists. In something of a treatise under the headline, "Are we bullying our young artists?" Pinkett Smith took the media to task, asking, "How can we ask for our young stars to have a high level of responsibility if we are not demonstrating that same level of responsibility towards them?" "It is as if we have forgotten what it means to be young or even how to behave like good ol' grown folk," she wrote.

When Jada Pinkett attended the Baltimore School for the Arts, she always showed up late. And on Friday, three years after graduation, she still arrived at school late -- but this time it was for an interview and she was in a white stretch limousine.Back in town for the weekend, Ms. Pinkett, who stars on NBC's "A Different World," visited friends, talked to former teachers, and was interviewed six times. Everyone, it seemed, was eager to talk to the woman who grew up in the Mount Washington neighborhood of Baltimore, then went to Los Angeles and made it big.Ms.

Jada Pinkett-Smith is inviting the world to listen in on an intimate family conversation with her daughter and her mother. The three generations -- Pinkett-Smith, Willow Smith and Adrienne Banfield-Jones -- sat down this year around a round, red table and taped the talk that ensued. They just released the trailer for the short film they made from the discussion which they're calling the "Red Table Talks. " The Baltimore-born actress and her family are calling it "an intimate and honest conversation about love, life, fame, and family.

When Jada Pinkett attended the Baltimore School for the Arts, she always showed up late. And on Friday, three years after graduation, she still arrived at school late -- but this time it was for an interview and she was in a white stretch limousine.Back in town for the weekend, Ms. Pinkett, who stars on NBC's "A Different World," visited friends, talked to former teachers, and was interviewed six times. Everyone, it seemed, was eager to talk to the woman who grew up in the Mount Washington neighborhood of Baltimore, then went to Los Angeles and made it big.Ms.