According to Jada Pinkett Smith, her late rapper pal suffered from the same condition as her and started losing his hair after his violent arrest for jaywalking in California.
- Oct 16, 2023
AceShowbiz - Jada Pinkett Smith has revealed Tupac Shakur suffered from alopecia. The 52-year-old actress struggles with the condition - which causes unpredictable hair loss - and she revealed her late friend also did, with the trigger for the autoimmune disease coming when he was arrested in 1991 for jaywalking in California, something the rapper later sued the police department over.
"I don't think Tupac ever talked about the alopecia he suffered from. After he was in Northern California with the police officers that beat him up, he started losing his hair. And his alopecia patterns were far more extreme than mine," Jada told People magazine.
The "Red Table Talk" host claimed her friend, who was shot dead in 1996, kept his condition a secret because of the pressures of the time, but thinks he'd be more open about it now if he were still alive.
She said, "I don't think Pac ever talked about his alopecia, but he also looked really good with a bald head. But that was during a time and during an era that you wouldn't - he just wouldn't talk about it. I'm sure if he were alive today, he would [speak about his condition publicly]."
Jada first revealed she has alopecia in 2018 and she hopes she can help end the "shame" around the condition. She said, "I'm glad that I've had the opportunity and we'll continue to have the opportunity to talk about how alopecia affects me. And I'm just hoping that it'll give people the freedom to talk about how and just not have shame around it and not to have such a stigma. And there's a lot of shame around alopecia."
The "Girls Trip" star recently branded Tupac her "soulmate" but insisted their friendship never turned romantic because they had "no chemistry." She told Rolling Out, "A soulmate, yeah. If there is such a thing as past lives, I definitely think Pac and I have travelled a few together. You know, in various forms."
She added of the lack of romance, "It just wasn't possible. There was no chemistry between us ... It's that friendship-love chemistry, trust me."
