Angelina Jolie
Why the actress won’t give up on her family
IN LONDON TO FILM MALEFICENT 2 last month, Angelina Jolie enjoyed a night out in the West End theatre district with her six children. They looked every inch the happy family as they strolled the streets of the city hand-in-hand. But not all reports of Jolie’s recent doings in are so positive. The actress has reportedly gone to great lengths to ensure she is granted full custody of Maddox, 17, Pax, 14, Zahara, 13, Shiloh, 12, and 10-year-old twins Vivienne and Knox, as her battle with her ex Brad Pitt heats up.
On Aug. 4, TMZ reported that Jolie has been “ridiculously unreasonable” and has a single-minded obsession with banning Pitt from access to his children. The website claimed that Jolie, who was granted primary physical custody in December 2016, is “fuelled with anger” towards Pitt and is allegedly on a mission to ensure he will have very little, if any, contact with her and the kids.
The 43-year-old star’s “hostile” behaviour is reported to have strained her relationship with her lawyer Laura Wasser with rumours circulating that the high-profile divorce lawyer—celebrity clients include Mariah Carey and Ashton Kutcher—is fed up with Jolie’s antics and has threatened to drop the custody case. But the Lara Croft: Tomb Raider star denied the claims. “The TMZ story is not true,” Jolie’s spokesperson told WHO on Aug. 7.“[Laura] is not quitting now or in the future.”
This is just the latest scandal to come from Jolie and Pitt’s headline-grabbing custody battle. In June this year, the Superior Court in Los Angeles ordered that it would be in the children’s best interests if Jolie let Pitt, 54, spend more time with the children. In court documents the judge determined that the kids “not having a relationship with their father is harmful to them.” That said, the judgement found the couple’s eldest child Maddox could choose whether or not he wanted to see each parent, due to his age.
Jolie was also ordered to provide her ex with contact numbers for each of their children so he can be in regular contact with them, as well as requiring her to come up with a suitable visitation schedule for Pitt. The court statement also explained that if Jolie prevented Pitt from seeing his younger children, she would risk losing sole physical custody of them, and it “may result in the court ordering primary physical custody to [Pitt].”
Pitt and Jolie famously met on the set
of Mr and Mrs Smith 14 years ago. The couple filed for divorce in September 2016, after just two years of marriage, following allegations of an altercation on a plane involving Pitt and the couple’s son Maddox. Following their split, Jolie released a statement saying she was ending the marriage “for the health of the family,” and that she will “always do what’s in the best interest to protect her children.”
It’s a stance she cemented during an interview with WHO’S US sister magazine, People, in 2017. “We all have our difficult times, but as a mother you also have a responsibility first and foremost towards the kids,” she said. “They are going through their formative years and everything else comes second to that.”
But the ongoing custody battle appears to have driven a bigger wedge between the former Hollywood power couple. “They are not on good terms and are less than civil,” a source told E!.
Despite this, Jolie is determined to stay strong for her children. “I want to make sure my kids are never worried about me,” she told The Wall Street Journal. “I never, ever want them to have that secret worry and feel that they have to take care of me.” •