From Fight Club to family man, Brad Pitt tells Mick Brown how being a father of six has changed him as a man and as an actor
There was a time when Brad Pitt, like most people, would enter a hotel through the front door, but that hasn’t happened for the best part of 20 years. ‘I’m usually carted up the ass end,’ as he puts it. And so it is that here, as everywhere else, he has been denied the pleasures of a hotel lobby thronged with the svelte and the affluent – for this is a very swanky hotel indeed – and too the pleasures of taking a stroll on a sunny autumn morning unmolested, lending his fourth-floor room, luxurious as it is, a curious air of confinement.
It is an air somewhat exaggerated by the fact that, in his downbeat sweatshirt and tracksuit trousers, the Kangol cap pulled down low over his forehead, the straggly half-beard, Pitt looks less like you expect him to look and more like a man attempting to disguise himself as his own minder.
In fact, Pitt’s minder is outside in the corridor, an imposing presence, standing quietly beside the gaggle of clipboard-wielding publicists. He is perhaps less a precautionary measure for Pitt – who with his muscled 6ft frame appears perfectly capable of looking after himself – than for his wife, Angelina Jolie, who is in an adjacent room being interrogated by a handful of European journalists.Being the most recognised show-business couple in the world has its own perils and disadvantages.
Pitt walks over to turn off the air conditioning and reaches for two bottles of water. He is a courteous man, his manner attentive and earnest. Very earnest. He is in London for discussions about his latest project as a producer, ‘a satire about the war in Afghanistan’ (he does not elaborate), but mostly to talk about his role in By the Sea, a new film written by, directed by and co-starring Jolie.
Category: By the Sea
BP Gallery Update






• x016 War Machine – Onset: Berlin, Germany (11/20/15).
• x025 November 03 – By the Sea (Q&A) – New York City, NY.
• x033 November 03 – By the Sea (Screening) – New York City, NY.
• x174 November 05 – By the Sea – Hollywood, CA.
• x060 November 04 – WSJ. Magazine 2015 Innovator Awards – New York City, NY.
• x005 Gente (Italy) 2015.
Thanks also Vaska!
That time Brad Pitt peed on Angelina Jolie Pitt’s shoes during By the Sea
Angelina Jolie Pitt wrote the script for By the Sea (in theaters Nov. 13) not knowing anyone would ever see it, let alone that she’d direct and star in the film alongside husband Brad Pitt.
In addition to exploring the subject of grief — the real-life pair play Vanessa and Roland, an estranged married couple who check in to a hotel in 1970s France while grappling with an unnamed sorrow — Jolie Pitt wanted to do a project where she could have creative freedom. “I always wanted to be on a set where I could explore and improvise.”
So when it came to making the film — which also stars Mélanie Laurent, Melvil Poupaud, and Niels Arestrup — that’s exactly the atmosphere she created. “I tried to make it clear to everybody that I wasn’t sensitive if they thought something should be said a different way, but I was surprised by how much people stuck to [the script]. A lot of our improv was in the behavior — though the crazy stuff didn’t make it into the film. It went awry,” she says. “We would try big crazy things, and then go, ‘Okay, that’s too far.’”
What’s too far exactly?
“Brad and I had this one day when we were like, ‘Let’s just do ridiculous things and see what happens.’ By the end of it, he had pissed all over my shoes, I had packed up the entire [hotel] room to leave, and he wrote ‘pillhead’ with an arrow on my head with a Sharpie while Vanessa was sleeping.” She laughs. “So it was interesting. The script led us to many beautiful discussions about life and loss. It bought everyone closer.”
By the Sea’s Costume Designer on ’70s French Glamour
By the Sea, the third directorial feature from Vogue November cover star Angelina Jolie Pitt, isn’t a walk in the park any way you slice it. Pare away the dreamy, ’70s South of France backdrop and the almost tangible glamour of the film’s leads and you’re left with a turbulent portrait of a collapsing marriage, brought to life by Jolie Pitt and her real-life husband, Brad Pitt. (Filming off Malta came hot on the heels of their nuptials.) The film’s tearstains and tempestuousness are underscored by the placidly sumptuous costumes, a visual feast served up in part by costume designer Ellen Mirojnick, whose past credits range from Face/Off to The Knick. We caught up with her by phone on location in Cambodia, where Jolie Pitt’s forthcoming endeavor, First They Killed My Father, a true-life account of life under the Khmer Rouge, is in production. Below, Mirojnick talks about why French style works, dressing Jolie Pitt after Jane Birkin, and what it’s really like to work with Hollywood’s most famous couple.
What was your preparation for the film like? How did you immerse yourself in those characters?
Aside from talking to the director and trying to understand the vision that Angie had and what she wanted to accomplish—I always use images to delve into a time period or a vibe. In this case, the late-’60s, early-’70s South of France. It was all thrilling to look at it because it’s so classic and glamorous and of its own time. Jane Birkin, Serge Gainsbourg, Charlotte Rampling, Peter Sellers even, Brigitte Bardot. Looking at those images, it just brings back a surge of je ne sais quoi, of absolute chic.
Angelina Jolie: ‘Brad and I drive each other mad’
Angelina Jolie’s new film is about a warring couple. Might it be based on someone she knows?
It seemed like a good idea at first: the newly married Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt thought they would combine filming By the Sea on location in Malta with their honeymoon. But it didn’t work out quite as they had planned.
“There were a few days when we thought [a working honeymoon] wasn’t the best idea,” laughs Jolie, who wrote, directed, produced and co-starred with Pitt in the low-budget domestic drama. “There were days during filming last year when we were really worried and it was hard.
If we had married and were just starting a relationship it would have been a disaster, but because we have been together so long we wanted to see how far we could push our relationship and our love and see if we can work together under very intense circumstances and with very complex issues and see if it would make us better.
“But at the end we came out of it thinking, ‘This was the best honeymoon,’ because the film says, ‘Whatever you go through, weather the storm and stick together.’
“So it was kind of a message to each other that we are going to stick together whatever comes.”