Angelina Jolie says her six children are “definitely individuals.”
The actress, 51, opened up about her parenting philosophy and future plans in a new interview with L’Officiel published Wednesday, touching on both her bond with her kids and her desire for a more nomadic life now that they have all reached adulthood.
“One of the most important things, I think, is to basically not get in their way,” she said. Jolie, who shares Maddox, 24, Pax, 22, Zahara, 21, Shiloh, 20, and 18-year-old twins Knox and Vivienne with ex-husband Brad Pitt, 62, expressed pride that each child follows their own path.
“As a parent, you try to do many things, but you also try to not get in the way of this human being who has a life separate from yours and so much potential in their own mind,” she continued. “You want to make sure that you support them.”
Now that her youngest children have become adults, Jolie is turning her attention toward her own long-deferred ambitions. She told the magazine she envisions “more field work, more travel, and just being out in the world,” adding that she hopes to “get my motorcycle back, get back in a plane.”
Her children are fully behind the shift. “That’s definitely what my kids want!” she shared. “They had Mom when Mom needed to be Mom. Now, they’d like me to call them from Tunisia having just landed a plane to meet with local artists.”
Jolie indicated she would like to live outside the United States and be “nomadic for a while,” without a fixed base. “I’m going to get back to doing more hands-on work with my foundation in Cambodia and my field work,” she explained. “I don’t really plan to have a base.”
The children are estranged from Pitt, and four of them — Maddox, Shiloh, Zahara and Vivienne — have taken legal steps to remove their father’s last name. A source said in July that Jolie “isn’t angry” and doesn’t want to fight her ex-husband. “She just wants everyone to heal,” the source said. “If people knew the whole truth they would have more sympathy for the children and respect them. The fact they aren’t speaking ill or sharing things publicly only shows their decency.”
Pitt, meanwhile, has spoken openly about his struggles since the divorce. Last month, he told Esquire that he was “suicidal” navigating “family stuff” a decade after the split. “The pain was so oppressive that — I wasn’t going to act on this, but I could feel — I could feel the cold steel of the bullet in my head, and it felt like relief,” he said. When asked whether he was dealing with “kid stuff,” Pitt replied, “Family stuff. We could leave it at that.”
Jolie’s interview marks a rare moment of public reflection on her family dynamics, even as her children have increasingly stepped into the spotlight themselves. Zahara, 21, recently made headlines with rare comments about her “unique” relationship with her mother, while Pax, 22, joined Jolie at a celebrity pickleball charity event.