While walking on a remote beach in Papua New Guinea, Shad Ellis found himself having a heart-to-heart with one of the most famous faces on the planet, Will Smith.

The twist? A London tube driver looked at a face that looked eerily similar to his own.

The 47-year-old has built a career as a Will Smith lookalike and tribute artist since he was 18 years old.

But after 30 years of “exciting” fans around the world, he finally told the Hollywood star how much that resemblance changed his life.

Ellis currently lives in Bedford, but was born and raised in the nation’s capital.

While The Fresh Prince famously began its story in a West Philadelphia playground, Ellis’ story unfolded deep underground in East London.

It was 1997 and Men in Black posters were plastered all over the subway network.

At Shadwell, commuters couldn’t ignore the similarities between the Hollywood stars painted on the walls and the station staff of the day behind the gates.

“I’ve had patrons come through the station and say, ‘Oh my god, you look like Will Smith,'” Shad recalls.

“They called me ‘Will’ as a joke and I didn’t think anything of it. Well, there was a bit of a resemblance, that’s all.”

One day, a stranger approached him with a tip that would change his life. He has a friend who makes money as a lookalike, so Ellis says he should give it a try.

This was a time before social media and selfie sticks, so Ellis had to take pictures of himself with a film camera while recreating Will’s magazine poses.

He sent them to the agency he found in the newspaper, and two weeks later they sent a letter saying he had the right look, but they warned that only royal lookalikes would actually make money.

“Within a week, I got my first job: on the cover of an electronics magazine, which was like a recreation of a Men in Black poster, except I had an electronic wind-up torch.

“From there I started meeting people and networking and then I started getting more jobs and meeting more people and it just kept growing.”

A few years later, at a karaoke night, Ellis’ friends convinced him to perform Ellis’ 90s hit single “Miami.” They liked it so much that they had him do it three times.

His agent then began booking him tribute artist slots at clubs such as Jumping Jacks and Envy across the country.

He said, “Anything you want Will Smith to do that you can’t afford to do, I’ll do.

“So I do a lot of corporate events, end-of-the-year work parties, weddings, private birthday functions, bar mitzvahs, etc.”

We also have magazine covers and global marketing campaigns that take us everywhere from Dubai to Singapore.

Occasionally, offers come in that Shad isn’t happy with, such as events impersonating the real Will Smith, stunts to make jokes about the actor, and even adult films.

“I’m quite protective of him and his brand, so I turn down a lot of work. They have to respect boundaries and things like that,” he insists.

After the infamous incident where Ellis slapped Chris Rock at the 2022 Oscars ceremony, Ellis was inundated with offers, which he turned down.

He refused to be a “money guy” because he felt he would have to look the star in the face someday.

Also in 2022, the doppelganger’s life has completely changed.

He was hired as a cast member for the National Geographic series Pole to Pole, in which Will Smith travels to seven continents in 100 days.

Ellis was flown to locations such as Botswana, Norway, and Papua New Guinea, allowing the crew to prepare shots and lighting before Smith’s arrival to maximize the actor’s time.

Occasionally, he was substituted for a busy star in aerial shots whose faces could not be clearly seen.

In the end, both men passed each other on set, but the lookalikes were hugged with handshakes and shoulder bumps.

The two ran into each other several times during filming, and Ellis said he was “very humbled and very grateful” for Smith’s work.

The star often said “good job” and “thank you” and even took time on set to wish Ellis a happy birthday.

After befriending one of Smith’s managers, Ellis requested, “Can I have five minutes with Will? Just me and him? No cameras required.”

And on the final day of filming in Papua New Guinea, the subway driver and the movie star strolled along a secluded beach.

He wasn’t trying to become “best friends” with the actor, he just wanted to use that time to express his gratitude, which was decades in the making.

He told Smith: “I just want to say how much I appreciate you and how much I appreciate you just for being you, because you’ve made me — someone I probably didn’t even know you existed — capable of doing amazing things.”

The Bad Boys actor described the lookalike’s work as “genius” and reacted with joy as he hugged him.

When Ellis said he was performing as a tribute artist, the star joked, “Shad, imagine you were doing a show and I came out! We’d shut down the internet.”

Despite his glamorous rise to fame, Ellis hasn’t given up on his day job and still sits in the driver’s seat on the London Underground.

The memory of the pole-to-pole shoot is still fresh in his mind. “The sun was shining, it was hot, and I was sitting there thinking, ‘This is so boring,’ and then I thought, ‘Yeah, but I could be driving a train.’

Ellis, who encountered the actor again this week at a staff screening of the series, has kept in touch with the production team he met overseas and hopes to work with him again in the future.

He says: “Every year I wake up in the morning and think, am I going to keep going?

“So guess what? I’m going to keep doing this until I don’t look like him or until all my hair falls out.”