Angelina Jolie is opening up about how pivotal a role motherhood plays in her life.
In a recent interview with The Sunday Times, published on Sunday, Dec. 1, the actress said that being a parent helps to keep feelings of loneliness at bay.
“I don’t feel that [loneliness] because I have family,” Jolie told the publication, referring to her role in the new biopic Maria, in which she plays world-renowned opera singer Maria Callas who died at the age of 53.
“Maria didn’t have a family, so her work was everything. My work is not everything," she continued. "Being a parent is everything.”
The famed actress went on to tell the publication that in preparing for the role—which included opera singing lessons—she came to realize that she was also working through her own personal emotions.
“It was the therapy I didn’t realize I needed,” she explained. “Singing opera requires you to be as emotionally open as you possibly can be—it’s not like singing in the car. It’s cathartic. I’ve never pushed myself or opened myself up in that way, that was daunting.”
Her recent interview is not the first time Jolie has compared her biopic role—and Maria the real-life person—to her own life.
"I’ve been a parent for 23 years. The most beautiful thing about being a parent is that you are not the center of your life," Jolie told the The Hollywood Reporter back in August, while promoting the film and discussing how special it was to have her two sons, Maddox and Pax, on set while filming.
"I have never had a set where my family is not allowed to be there because I’m focusing—I’m not that person. You can climb all over me or visit," she explained at the time. "It really meant a lot that my boys were with me on Maria. When I would have really heavy times, they would come over and just give me a hug or a cup of tea. That was probably one of the more intense things was that—usually when I’m expressing that much pain, it’s not in front of my children.
"You really try to hide from your children how much pain and sadness you carry," she added. "And so for them to be with you when you’re expressing it at such a level, I think it was the first time they ever heard me cry like that. That’s usually for the shower."
That same month, Jolie opened up about what she believed she has most in common with the late opera singer.
"I related to the part of her that is extremely soft and didn’t have room in the world to be as soft as she truly was and as emotionally open as she truly was," Jolie said, as reported by People at the time. "I think I share her vulnerability more than anything."
Jolie shares six children—Maddox, 23 Pax, 20, Zahara, 19, Shiloh, 18, and twins Knox and Vivienne, 16—with her ex, Brad Pitt. The pair split in 2016 and have been engaged in a prolonged legal battle over their impending divorce ever since. (Pitt and Jolie were declared legally single back in 2019.)
In a 2023 interview with Vogue, Jolie credited her children for keeping her from entering a "darker" place.
"I think, recently, I would’ve gone under in a much darker way had I not wanted to live for them," she explained at the time. "They’re better than me because you want your children to be.”
