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Louise Thomas
Editor
Angelina Jolie has shared her candid thoughts about having close friendships.
The 49-year-old actor opened up about some of the bonds she’s formed with others over the years during an interview with The Hollywood Reporter, published on August 30. When asked who she felt were her close friends, she said she didn’t have many, while reflecting on the experiences she’s had in her life.
“I don’t really have those kinds of relationships. Maybe it’s losing your parent young. Maybe it’s working,” the mother of six children – who she shares with ex-husband Brad Pitt – shared. “Maybe it’s being somebody who’s been betrayed a lot.”
However, the Maleficent star still acknowledged that she has good friends to turn to in times of need, including Cambodian-American human rights activist Loung Ung.
“I don’t have a lot of those warm, close relationships as much that I lean on. But I have a few, and a few is enough. Loung is one of my closest friends. My mother was very close to me. I lost her,” she added, referring to her mother Marcheline Bertrand, who died in 2007 from ovarian and breast cancer. “I’ve had a few friends over the years not be there for my family in their hour of need.”
Jolie clarified that she has no problem keeping her inner circle small, similar to what beloved opera singer Maria Callas - who the actor portrays in Pablo Larraín’s new biopic, Maria - did.
“I have a couple of people that I trust. What did Maria Callas die with? Two trusted people,” she added.
During the interview, Jolie also opened up about the work she’s done with refugees at camps and war zones, where she’s “seen the best of humanity and the absolute worst.” She also noted that now she has a home in Cambodia, which is where she’s also formed some meaningful friendships.
“My neighbors have been through war and many of my closest friends. I suppose it’s just a large part of what it is to be human, to understand why we do this to each other and how we get through it. I’ve never had to experience war or lose somebody through armed conflict,” the Mr. and Mrs. Smith star said. “But I have people I care very deeply about who have. I’ve seen people who have nothing give everything. And I’ve seen people who have everything do nothing.
Last year, Jolie shared similar sentiments about having only a few close friends in her life. During an interview with WSJ Magazine in December, she said that while she’s living in Los Angeles, she doesn’t “really have…a social life,” and once again acknowledged that her dearest friends are refugees.
“Maybe four out of six of the women that I am close to are from war and conflict,” she said at the time, before recalling her struggle with depression and thoughts of suicide during the height of her fame, and how she’d “wanted to escape.” Following that experience, she went on to visit refugee camps in Cambodia, Tanzania, Sierra Leone, and Pakistan, before starting her work with the United Nations refugee agency in 2001.
“There’s a reason people who have been through hardship are also much more honest and much more connected, and I am more relaxed with them,” she said. “Why do I like spending time with people who’ve survived and are refugees? They’ve confronted so much in life that it brings forward not just strength, but humanity.”
Elsewhere in her interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Jolie opened up about her family dynamics, amid her lengthy divorce from Pitt. She noted that while she grew up in Los Angeles and still lives there, she doesn’t plan on staying there when her children become adults.
“I have to be here from a divorce. But as soon as they’re 18, I’ll be able to leave,” she said, referring to her and Pitt’s 16-year-old twins, Vivienne and Knox. “When you have a big family, you want them to have privacy, peace, safety. I have a house now to raise my children, but sometimes this place can be … that humanity that I found across the world is not what I grew up with here. [After Los Angeles,] I’ll spend a lot of time in Cambodia. I’ll spend time visiting my family members wherever they may be in the world.”
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