Jada Pinkett Smith says that divorce "didn't feel right" for her and Will Smith.
Jada Pinkett Smith and Will Smith opted against divorce
The 52-year-old star revealed earlier this week that she and her husband have been separated since 2016 and has now explained that they planned to divorce but ultimately did not go through with it.
Quizzed on the differences between separation and divorce, Jada told The Sunday Times magazine: "Well, we needed the time.
"Will and I got married at an early age and we were able to make some beautiful things and some not so beautiful things.
"We got to a place where we had to go our separate ways in order to break from some of those more immature fantasies of what being married was about.
"And bear in mind, when we had that separation in 2016 the goal was to divorce, but divorce just didn't feel right for either of us. We don't know why. But here we are."
The 'Red Table Talk' host - who has son Jaden, 25, and daughter Willow, 22, with Will - explained that she does not live with her estranged husband at the moment but expects to do so again in the future so she can "take care" of the 'Independence Day' actor.
Jada said: "To be honest with you, I think eventually we will (live together again) I really do.
"Will's getting old. I'm staying quite young, but it's getting apparent to me that he's gonna need someone to take care of him."
The couple still support each other in their "life partnership" and it was a joke about Jada's alopecia that resulted in Will infamously slapping comedian Chris Rock at the Oscars last year - but 'The Matrix' star rubbished suggestions that she encouraged him to react violently.
She said: "People thought I gave Will a look and ‘made’ him do it. But let me start with this: nobody can make Will Smith do anything, and surely not me.
"If I could make Will do anything the last three decades of my marriage would have looked totally different. Real talk, right?
"And I also want to say, it’s really ironic how women are considered, what do you say, irrelevant? Until a man does something that’s unsavoury, and suddenly she has all the power in the world to make him do that."
Tagged in Chris Rock Will Smith Jada Pinkett Smith