Insiders: Brad Pitt will marry again
Friends say actor’s dating, ‘he’s not a monk’
BRAD Pitt’s marriages to two of the world’s most famous women, Jennifer Aniston and Angelina Jolie, may have ended in divorce — but friends still expect he’ll marry again. “He’s not a monk!” said one pal. The 54-year-old star has been dating quietly amid a turbulent and ongoing divorce from Jolie, which has still not been finalized due to a bitter custody battle over their six children. “To say these two years have been a nightmare is an understatement,” a source close to Pitt told The Post. Since Jolie, 43, stunned Hollywood by filing for divorce from Pitt in September 2016 after 12 years together, every woman the actor is seen with is dubbed a potential new fling by the media. In April, a friendship with American-Israeli MIT professor Neri Oxman, 42, sparked reports of romance. Oxman denied any romantic relationship in an interview with The New York Times earlier this month, and Page Six recently reported that the instructor of media arts and sciences is now engaged to billionaire hedgefund manager Bill Ackman. Pitt met her while both were involved in an architecture project at MIT. But “Brad was never dating Neri — they are friends and their relationship is totally professional,” the pal said. Then, on Oct. 1, Pitt was pictured enjoying the company of spiritual healer and jewelry designer Sat Hari Khalsa, 49, at the Silverlake Conservatory of Music annual benefit and art auction in Los Angeles, hosted by their mutual pal, Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea. Pitt is a close friend of the musician, while Sat has toured
A source who has worked closely with the actor I can’t see Brad dating someone super famous again.
with his band as a holistic nurse — giving the Chili Peppers ozone therapy, in which the gas is pumped intraveneously into the body to purify the bloodstream.
Sat — an American Sikh who was shipped off to boarding school in the Himalayas at the age of 10 — reportedly found her way into the lyrics of a 2002 Chili Peppers song, “Can’t Stop”: “So smart she’s leading me to ozone.” In his 2004 memoir, “Scar Tissue,” band frontman Anthony Kiedis also calls her one of his “main soul mates,” albeit seemingly platonic.
In the book, Kieidis writes: ‘Sat Hari is a nurse . . . a sweet, incredibly sheltered, turban-wearing young lady. She looks like a female version of Flea, with the same gap-toothed smile, the same shape of face, the same color eyes, the same little pug nose. She’s maternal and she’s warm and she’s loving and she’s unassuming, a complete breath of fresh air and female energy, and I don’t mean sexual energy, at least not for me. For me she’s like a sister and mother and caretaker and nurse all in one.
“Everyone [in the band] used her as their ultimate confidante, spilling their guts to her all day and all night about their deepest, darkest, most untellable secrets,” Kiedis writes.
Sat worked as a ski instructor, security guard and even an accountant before training in integrative medicine.
A friend of Khalsa’s told The Post the divorced mother-of-one, who lives in Los Angeles, has “wonderful energy” and calls her “totally awesome,” adding: “The Chili Peppers are a very spiritual band and the healers they had traveling with them were top-notch.”
PITT insiders aren’t convinced Khalsa’s the one for him, although she does fit his new MO. “I can’t see Brad dating someone super famous again, I can definitely see him dating someone with a lower profile,” said someone who has worked closely with the actor.
Insiders say Pitt, who is currently filming director Quentin Tarantino’s “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood” in Los Angeles, has been “hanging out” with a few women over the past few months. But he’s working to keep things private after having had so many very public relationships over the years, with such famous women as Gwyneth Paltrow, Juliette Lewis and Jennifer Aniston, to whom he was married from 2000 to 2005.
The spotlight can be a “challenge” for people who aren’t used to it, said the source who has worked with Pitt. “There’s all this gossip and suddenly this person becomes a public character.”
While some of Hollywood’s leading men, such as Ben Affleck, choose to date busty Playboy models after their very public marital splits, this is not the path for Pitt, according to friends.
But he is meeting women through his most trusted pals, who include sculptor Thomas Houseago and Dede Gardner, the president of his Oscar-winning production company, Plan B.
“He just likes hanging out with his friends and anyone he meets will have to be from a place of trust,” said the source who has worked with him.
According to the pal: “He’s focused on his children, his work and wanting to have some sense of normalcy. He’s dat- ing casually but, for the foreseeable future, everything is about the kids.”
That said, insiders tell The Post that Pitt is not looking to have more children.
(A representative for the actor had no comment.)
After months of legal back-and-forth, Pitt and Jolie this week appear to be closer to reaching a final resolution on a custody deal for their children. On Oct. 8, Dr. Stan Katz, the child-custody evaluator appointed by the court, submitted his documents from the family visits.
Pitt now gets to see his children four hours every other day and 12 hours on the weekend as part of the current legal agreement.
The judge in the case has already scolded Jolie for trying to drive a wedge between Pitt and the children, and warned that if she didn’t improve their relationship, she could lose custody.
The actor “rarely” speaks to Jolie, the pal said. “The divorce is still an ongoing process. It’s not easy.”
Insiders add that two years of public scrutiny have left the actor “wary” of launching into a serious romance anytime soon.
“He’s never been ‘woe is me’ — he’s very grateful for everything he has — but the public obsession with everything he does is just hard. He wants to be with someone nice, it’s just going to take a while before a long-term relationship can happen.”
Asked if one could envisage a Mrs. Pitt Number 3 in the future, the pal replied, “Brad comes from a very traditional family, he’s very close to his parents, Jane and Bill, and his brother and sister are both married with families. I could see him marrying again, but it will be a much more low-key relationship.”
FOR now, insiders say, Pitt is continuing to work on himself in a way that will make him an even better partner one day. As he told GQ in 2017, “You know, I just started therapy. I love it, I love it. I went through two therapists to get to the right one.”
He also revealed how he had given up booze and smoking marijuana in favor of cranberry juice and sparkling water, admitting, “I’ve got my feelings in my fingertips again. I think that’s part of the human challenge: You either deny them all of your life or you answer them and evolve.”
In August, The Post reported that Jolie “doesn’t want Brad to move on,” according to a family source.
Now the actor is trying to work through the variety of accusations that emerged during his divorce from Jolie, including allegations of child abuse against eldest son Maddox and claims that he has failed to make “meaningful” child support payments.
(Pitt has denied all of the claims, and the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services has cleared him of the child-abuse allegations. In November 2016, Pitt was also cleared by the FBI of any wrongdoing related to the allegations.)
“Brad’s only made two public statements since the split. He’s tried to be quiet for the sake of the children and he will never say anything bad about Angie as a mother, but he’s hurt,” said the source who has worked with him.
“We just hope he finds peace and love again.”