Angelina Jolie
The actress on keeping it together for her family
DESPITE BEING ON HAND TO promote her super-charged roles in Maleficent: Mistress of Evil and Marvel’s The Eternals, Angelina Jolie opened up about her vulnerability at the D23 Expo in Anaheim, California, on August 25. “I’m like everybody and … especially these last few years haven’t been the easiest, and I haven’t felt very strong,” the actress told
E! News. “There’s something when you’re not feeling very strong, where you push yourself. And I’m so grateful that I have the opportunity to play these kinds of characters, that pull out every bit of strength I have and that remind me that I can be strong.”
Jolie, 44, is approaching the third anniversary of when she filed for divorce from Brad Pitt, 55, on September 19, 2016, for what she called “the health of her family”. The past few years have been tumultuous as they have warred over custody arrangements for their six kids – Maddox, 18, Pax, 15, Zahara, 14, Shiloh, 13, and 11-year-old twins Vivienne and Knox.
Compounding Jolie’s stress is having to deal with her eldest leaving the nest to study biochemistry at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. While Pitt has had a strained relationship with Maddox since they allegedly got into an altercation on a plane in 2016 – an incident that prompted Jolie to end her marriage – the mother and son are “incredibly close,” a source tells US Weekly.
Speaking to Entertainment Tonight, Jolie got teary-eyed talking about the rest of the family’s farewells to their big brother. “When you know that your kids love each other and you see the way they all … without any kind of prompting or pushing … then you feel like they’re going to be OK and they’re always going to have each other,” she said.
For her part, Jolie admitted she let out an “embarrass-your-children ugly cry” at the airport, behind big glasses and turned around to wave goodbye “six times” before finally leaving. “It’s nice to know how much he knows he’s loved,” she said. “But yeah, I miss him. I miss him.”