BIOGRAPHIES
ANGELINA JOLIE’S BIOGRAPHY (JUMP TO BRAD PITT’S BIOGRAPHY)
It all started in Los Angeles on 4 June 1975, when actor Jon Voight and actress Marcheline Bertrand welcomed Angelina Jolie Voight into the world. Angelina grew up in Los Angeles and Palisades, New York. Jolie has one brother, with whom she is notoriously associated with for an Oscar-winning kiss, James Haven.
In 1982, Jolie made her onscreen debut alongside her father in Lookin’ to Get Out but she was not a child actor. She began acting with fervor in 1993, with a small role in the low budget film Cyborg 2. It was 1995’s Hackers that allowed Jolie her first leading role. Throughout her early career and to date, Jolie has been blessed with excellent roles and raw talent.
In 1999, Angelina Jolie’s career would change forever with the nomination and later win of the Best Supporting Actress Oscar for her role of Lisa in Girl, Interrupted. From there, we would come to see Jolie in some of the most entertaining films to date including Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (2001), Gone in Sixty Seconds (2000), Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow (2000), Mr. & Mrs. Smith (2005), and Changeling (2008).
While Angelina Jolie may be well known for her acting career, it is more her life and humanitarian efforts that have brought her worldwide recognition. Though she was obviously bitten by the acting bug like her Oscar-winning father, she has repeatedly said that it was not he who influenced her love of the craft. Jolie’s parents divorced in 1976 and she did not see much of Voight during her formative years. In fact today they share a very strained, if nonexistent, relationship. Jolie remained close to her mother until Bertrand’s death in 2007.
Growing up, Jolie dabbled in acting, but had a rocky adolescence. She dressed all in black, dyed her hair purple, and decided to become a funeral director. In high school, she collected knives, cut herself, and had a live-in boyfriend. Jolie would also discover her love of tattoos during her teenage years.
Her young adulthood and perhaps early success has inspired Jolie to make a difference in the world. As an actress she had the opportunity to travel the world and see its pain. Because of this, she has made a point to be involved in many charities benefiting Asia, Africa, and other parts of the world. Today, Jolie is a Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations.
In 1996, she married actor Jonny Lee Miller and stayed with him until 1999. It would be her second marriage that would really make a mark on the world – to Billy Bob Thornton. The two were married from 2000 to 2003 and thought to be one of Hollywood’s oddest couples, wearing vials of each other’s blood and having a Velcro wall in their home.
In 2005, Jolie would cause controversy again by her scandalous involvement with Brad Pitt, with whom she still lives today. At the time that the two met on the set of Mr. & Mrs. Smith, Pitt was still married to Jennifer Aniston. Jolie adopted a son, Maddox, at the end of her marriage to Thornton and whom Pitt has since taken on as his own. Together they also have two other adopted children, Pax, a son, and Zahara, a daughter. Angelina Jolie also has three biological children with Pitt – Shiloh, Vivienne, and Knox.
Though he was born in Shawnee, Oklahoma on 18 December 1963, William Bradley Pitt was raised in Springfield, Missouri by parents Jane Etta Hillhouse and William Pitt. In this biography of Brad Pitt, you will see how a modest upbringing has influenced his choices in career, life, and humanitarian works. Pitt has two younger siblings, sister, Julie Neal Pitt and brother, Douglas Pitt.
Throughout high school Pitt was avidly involved in such activities as debate, student government, sports, and school musicals. He went on to college at the University of Missouri to major in journalism with a focus on advertising. In college, he would occasionally act in fraternity shows, but was not involved in theater. Just two credits shy of graduation, Pitt packed it all in and headed for Hollywood to pursue an acting career. He would survive in the early days by moving refrigerators, driving limos, and dressing off as a chicken to advertise for el Pollo Loco.
Despite his modest upbringing and humble beginnings in Hollywood, Brad Pitt has not only become a successful award-winning actor, but also a two-time Academy Award nominee, a successful film producer, and an effective humanitarian. He is also known for being one of the world’s sexiest men and his romantic involvements with Jennifer Aniston and, most currently, Angelina Jolie.
Pitt’s acting career began like most, with guest appearances on soap operas (namely Dallas) and commercials. However, he gained the most notoriety and perhaps got his big break by landing the cowboy hitchhiker role in Thelma and Louise (1991) that seduces Geena Davis’ character. That one little role led to impressive roles in films such as A River Runs Through It (1992), Interview with the Vampire (1994), Legends of the Fall (1994), for which he received his first Golden Globe nomination, and Twelve Monkeys (1995), for which he was nominated for both a Golden Globe and an Oscar. Brad Pitt’s career would flourish in the 1990s and has only gotten better today.
His well-received roles would solidify his place in Hollywood as a leading man, but his 1999 role of Tyler Durden in the cult hit Fight Club would bring him worldwide attention. In the early 2000’s, Pitt appeared in hits including Ocean’s Eleven (2001), Ocean’s Twelve (2004), and Ocean’s Thirteen (2007). His biggest commercial success would come with Troy (2004) and 2005’s Mr. & Mrs. Smith where he would eventually meet Angelina Jolie. In 2008, Pitt was nominated for his second Oscar for his title role in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button.
Fans know and love Brad Pitt’s work as an actor, but they also follow his personal life fervently. He has been romantically linked with the likes of Juliette Lewis and was engaged at one time to Gwyneth Paltrow. In 2000, he and Jennifer Aniston married and were known as a Hollywood super couple. It would last only until 2005, when Pitt allegedly began an affair with costar Angelina Jolie, with whom he still lives. Together, they have adopted three children, Maddox, Pax, and Zahara in addition to their three biological children together, Shiloh, Vivienne, and Knox.
Any biography on Brad Pitt would be incomplete without the mention of his humanitarian and charitable work. He supports a number of causes including ONE Campaign, which fights AIDS, and poverty in third-world countries. He has founded several non-profit organizations including Not On Our Watch, Make It Right Foundation, and the Jolie-Pitt Foundation.
