Karyn Parsons may have played a privileged princess on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, but in real life, the former actress is very different from her beloved character, Hilary Banks. After the show ended in 1996, Parsons kept attended auditions, but she quickly grew frustrated with her lack of success. Eventually, she acknowledged that she'd lost her passion for acting and wanted to instead concentrate on philanthropic endeavours. "When I was pregnant with my daughter, that's when I started really thinking about what are they going to teach her in school, and what am I supposed to teach her? How do I supplement her education as a parent?" Parsons told Vice in 2019. "As I was talking a lot about Black history and stories that you don't hear about, my husband was like, you need to do this." Parsons now runs the Sweet Blackberry Foundation, which shares stories of lesser-known African-American heroes with children.