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The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air is an American television sitcom that originally aired on NBC from September 10, 1990 to May 20, 1996. The show starred Will Smith as a street-smart teenager from West Philadelphia who is sent to live with his wealthy relatives in a Bel Air mansion. His lifestyle often clashed with that of his relatives there. 148 episodes were produced over six seasons.

Conception
Will Smith was a popular and successful rapper during the late 1980s, but, because he had spent money too freely and grossly underpaid his income taxes, he was assessed a penalty of $2.8 million by the IRS. The agency subsequently seized many of his possessions and garnished his income. This left Smith nearly bankrupt when, in 1990, he was approached by the television network NBC who signed him on to a contract and built a sitcom around him.

Theme song and opening sequence
The theme song and opening sequence explains the context of the show. Will Smith is revealed as a street-smart teenager, born and raised on the mean streets of West Philadelphia, while the plot of the story is shown in the theme song.

The theme song was written and performed by The Fresh Prince (Will Smith). Contrary to popular belief, DJ Jazzy Jeff did not compose the music for the opening credits. The music was composed by Quincy Jones, who is credited at the end of each episode. An additional credit at the end of episodes also reads "Theme song written by Will Smith", in regards to the lyrics, with no reference to DJ Jazzy Jeff. The music often used to bridge scenes together during the show is also based on a similar chord structure to the theme song. This too is the work of Quincy Jones III. The full version of the theme song, telling how he went on a plane to Bel-Air, was used unedited on some earlier episodes. Will Smith recorded this version as an unreleased B-side. The full-length version, which is 2:52", was included on Will Smith's Greatest Hits album and attributed to himself only. A 3:23" version was released in the Netherlands in 1992, and reached #3 on the charts.

For the first few episodes of the show stanzas one to three and stanzas six and seven were used. Beginning with Episode #9 (titled "Someday Your Prince Will Be in Effect (2)"), only the first two and the last two stanzas of the song were used. The change to the theme song allowed for longer episodes to be created.

Seasons 1, 5, and 6 featured an instrumental version of the theme and still photographs from the episode for the closing credits. In Seasons 2, 3, and 4, the music and stills were dropped and closing credits would almost always appear over bloopers and outtakes from the episode.

The Banks mansion
The mansion is where the Banks family, as well as Will, live; the address was revealed in the fourth season's "For Sale By Owner" as 805 Saint Cloud Road. A majority of the show's scenes take place in the mansion. Originally, most of the family scenes took place in the living room, with less prominence given to the kitchen. The living room set had archways at either end to hallways, and two doorways at the back of the set to the side yard. The right-side hallway was occasionally shot in, and had a staircase upstairs, and the front door. The kitchen set was not attached to the rest of the downstairs set, and was unconventionally laid out compared to many sitcoms: The left side had counters that continued along the fourth wall (where the audience would be), and had a lot of depth (from the audience perspective), with camera angles frequently shooting almost parallel to the fourth wall. The set had two interior doors; one of which, at the right side of the set, led to the hallway left of the living room (though was not attached on set), and an exterior door to the unseen back yard. There was a dining room also off the hallway left of the living room. The upper floor hallway was shown in Season 1, until the mansion sets were completely rebuilt after the season.

In the second season, the kitchen and living room sets were rebuilt much larger with a more contemporary style (as opposed to the much more formal style of the first season), and were connected directly by an archway, allowing scenes to be shot continuously between the sets, which is where most scenes were shot. The staircase upstairs was incorporated into the back of the living room, with only one rarely-used exit to the side yard beside it. An actual television prop was added at the fourth wall, whereas there had only been one implicitly in the first season. The archway to the right still led to a hallway with the front door. The only element that remained from the original set was the kitchen's left-hand wall and island which were rotated ninety degrees to become the back wall at the right of the kitchen, with some modification to the cosmetics. The archway was the only way into the room, other than the exit at the left to the backyard patio, which was now an existing part of the main house set.

In addition, Will's and occasionally other family members', rooms were shown (sometimes changing looks between appearances) during the series. The pool house was shown in one episode of season 3. A different set was used when it became a main location in season 4 until the end of the series, after Will and Carlton moved in.

Despite the changes, the exterior shot of the Banks house, which is an actual house in Bel-Air, Los Angeles, California, was constant throughout the series, usually featured in still shots. A running gag, however, featured Jazz being physically thrown out of the front door using the exterior of the house. Every time he is thrown out of the house, he is shown wearing the same shirt although he does not always wear it when he is thrown out (the producers never shot a second sequence with Jazz being thrown out of the house, only adjusting the original scene for time purposes; an exception is in the episode "Community Action", where Jazz was thrown out along with a lifesize cardboard cut-out of Bill Cosby, complete with a blooper showing Jeff Townes reshooting his flying off the house several times).

Bel-Air Academy
Bel-Air Academy is the high school that Will and Carlton attend in Seasons 1–3. Ashley also starts as Freshman in Season 3. The 3 main sets are the classroom, a hallway and the auditorium (the auditorium was only shown in three episodes: "Def Poet's Society", "Courting Disaster" and "Just Say Yo").

Hospital
A hospital in Los Angeles is seen in several episodes which deal with the Banks family's medical problems. The exterior shot of the hospital is a shot of the VA Hospital in nearby Westwood.

Jazz's apartment in Compton
Jazz lives with a few friends in a run-down apartment complex in Compton, California called the Chalet Towers. This setting was seen in the first four seasons.

KFPB Channel 8 News station
This setting was seen throughout Season 3 because Hilary was hired as a weather girl and fell in love with Trevor Collins, who died in a bungee accident in Season 4. Due to his death, the setting was written off towards the end of the 4th Season. The setting returned in Season 6 because Hilary's own talk show was produced there.

ULA Student Store
The ULA Student Store, also known as "The Peacock Stop" for the school mascot, is where Will, Carlton, and Will's friend Jackie Ames work. In Season 4, Jackie is the manager, Carlton is the assistant manager, and Will is the cashier. When Jackie leaves ULA in the middle of Season 4, Carlton takes over as manager and Will becomes assistant manager and cashier until Season 5.

American television ratings
Seasonal rankings (based on average total viewers per episode) of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air on NBC.

Note: U.S. network television seasons generally start in late September and end in late May, which coincides with the completion of the May sweeps.

Syndication & DVD releases
The series was originally an NBC production in association with The Stuffed Dog Company and Quincy Jones Productions (later QDE, or Quincy Jones/David Salzman Entertainment). After the show was released to syndication in 1994, the rights reverted to Warner Bros. Television, which continues to distribute the show worldwide (although NBC Universal does own the series' copyright). WGN America was the first cable channel to acquire the series in 1997, TBS acquired the series a year later in 1998; both channels carried the series until the fall of 2003, though TBS reacquired the series in 2007. The theme song was shown in the original TBS run, but after TBS re-acquired Fresh Prince in 2007, the opening credits were truncated and the theme song removed and replaced with the instrumental version used as the show's closing theme.

The series aired on Nick at Nite from 2004 to 2009, as well as sister network (through Nickelodeon) The N (now TeenNick), but was dropped from its schedule in September 2009 after Disney/ABC purchased the rights to the show. Currently, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air airs on various local television stations around the U.S. as well as on cable channels TBS, ABC Family and Disney XD.

Internationally, the show was exclusively aired in 1991 on BBC Two in the UK up until the Summer 2004. The channel edited the episodes so that, like the pilot, the titles would come before the beginning of the episode; this was indicated by the lack of credits in the first scene. It is currently being aired on the British digital TV channel Virgin 1 after its formerly-owned channel Trouble which aired it from 1997 until the Channel closed. In Canada, it airs on YTV.

Warner Home Video has released the first four seasons of the series on DVD in Regions 1, 2 & 4. After almost four years since the release of the fourth season, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air: The Complete Fifth Season will be released on Region 1 DVD, May 11, 2010; no other details have been provided.