They were once the very definition of the “It couple”, with a seemingly unshakeable union to make them the darlings of Hollywood.
But the Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie fairytale ended in August 2016 when the couple filed for divorce — and things have only become messier.
As their divorce proceedings play out in the spotlight, there have been allegations of abuse from Jolie; a high-profile custody battle; claims of forced non-disclosure agreements (NDAs); and a dispute over the ownership of their Chateau Miraval winery in the south of France, dubbed The War of the Rosé.
And as if the couple’s split couldn’t get any more chaotic, the children are now weighing in.
The couple’s daughter Shiloh has filed a legal request to drop her father’s surname amid the ongoing feud. She filed the court papers on her 18th birthday last week, asking to change her surname from “Shiloh Jolie-Pitt” to simply “Shiloh Jolie”.
The move is the latest indication of the distant relationship between Pitt and his children since splitting from Jolie eight years ago.
In November last year, comments made by Jolie and Pitt's 19-year-old adopted son Pax via his private Instagram stories three years ago resurfaced. Pax called his father a "world-class a**hole" on Father's Day 2020.
The full Instagram story pulls no punches: "Happy Father's Day to this world-class a***hole! You time and time and again prove yourself to be a terrible and despicable person.
"You have no consideration or empathy toward your four youngest children who tremble in fear when in your presence. You will never understand the damage you have done to my family because you are incapable of doing so.
"You have made the lives of those closest to me a constant hell. You may tell yourself and the world whatever you want, but the truth will come to light someday.
"So, Happy Father's Day, you f***ing awful human being!"
Brangelina (do we still call them that?) have six children in total, three of whom are adopted (Maddox, Pax, and Zahara), and three who are biological (Shiloh, Vivienne, and Knox). Jolie told Vogue in October 2023 that her children “saved” her “and taught me to be in this world differently” after a difficult few years.
Here’s everything to know about the pair’s kids, and what they are up to now.
Maddox Chivan Jolie-Pitt, 22
Jolie and Pitt's oldest child, Maddox Chivan Jolie-Pitt, was born on August 5, 2001, in Battambang, Cambodia.
After living in an orphanage for seven months, Jolie adopted him after becoming enamoured with the country while filming Lara Croft: Tomb Raider the previous year. At the time of Maddox’s adoption, Jolie was still married to actor Billy Bob Thornton, but she decided to adopt him on her own.
Jolie was initially nervous about motherhood, writing in TIME that she “never thought” she could be a mother because of her unstable childhood. "I remember the decision to become a parent. It wasn’t hard to love. It wasn’t hard to dedicate myself to someone and something greater than my life,” she wrote. “What was hard was knowing that from now on I needed to be the one to make sure everything was okay.”
Jolie told Vanity Fair she felt an instant connection with Maddox at the orphanage. She said she “cried and cried” after seeing him lying in a box suspended from the ceiling.
Jolie and Thornton split up a few months after bringing Maddox to the States. Jolie raised Maddox as a single parent until she started dating Pitt in 2004. The following year, Pitt began the process of adopting Maddox too.
Despite being part of one of the world’s most high-profile families Maddox has maintained a relatively private life. His first red carpet appearance was at the 2004 Venice Film Festival for his mum’s film Shark Tale, where his famous faux hawk hairdo stole the show. His next real public outing was in 2009 when he attended the premiere of Invictus.
Aged just 13 in 2015, he worked as a trainee in Jolie’s film By The Sea. Two years later, he was credited as an executive producer for her Netflix film First They Killed My Father in 2017, based on a book about the Cambodian genocide by the Khmer Rouge regime. Jolie later explained that she took Maddox on the film to help him learn "about who he is" and become "that much more connected to his country”.
"He goes back and forth [to Cambodia] a lot, but this would be over four months of just being in the country, really reading, listening, learning and absorbing all things about his culture and country [including] the very, very dark parts," she told People.
Maddox is reportedly estranged from his adoptive father Pitt. He testified against Pitt in court after Jolie made allegations of abuse against him during a private jet incident in September 2016. A source told Us weekly: “Maddox has already given testimony as an adult in the ongoing custody dispute and it wasn’t very flattering toward Brad.”
In 2019, Maddox left the US to study biochemistry at Yonsei University in Seoul, South Korea. While dropping her eldest off, Jolie admitted to having an “embarrass-your-children ugly cry” as she said goodbye.
Zahara Marley Jolie-Pitt, 19
Jolie adopted Zahara from Hawassa, Ethiopia, when she was just seven months old, while on a visit with Maddox in 2005. Her then-boyfriend Pitt accompanied her on her second trip to the country to make the adoption official.
Following in her mother’s footsteps, Zahara has a keen eye for fashion. When she was 14, she collaborated with jeweller Robert Procop to create the Zahara Collection jewellery line, with the proceeds going to LA’s House of Ruth Shelters. This provides a transitional home for women and children in need.
Jolie has been outspoken about raising her daughter to be proud of her Ethiopian heritage.
"My daughter is from Ethiopia, one of my children … And I have learned so much from her," she said during a TIME 100 Talk in 2020. "She is my family, but she is an extraordinary African woman and her connection to her country, her continent, is her own and it’s something I only stand back in awe of."
Jolie even took Zahara to meet the first female president of Ethiopia, Sahle-Work Zewde, in 2019. They discussed education, period poverty, Ethiopian history and culture, and Jolie’s efforts to treat tuberculosis.
Zahara also seems to have inherited her mother’s penchant for philanthropy. In 2021, the pair discussed the Violence Against Women Act with politicians in the US. In December 2022, she joined her mother on a visit to Washington D.C., where they met lawmakers to advocate the protection of crime victims.
In an interview with Vanity Fair, Jolie described her eldest daughter, whom she calls “Zaz”, as the “rock” of the family.
In the summer of 2022, Zahara began her education at Spelman College, an HBCU (historically black colleges and universities). Last year, she joined the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority, the first historically black sorority.
When the 18-year-old Spelman undergraduate declared herself at the sorority induction ceremony, she reportedly shouted “Zahara Marley Jolie,” notably not including her father’s last name, according to a video obtained by Essence.
Shiloh Nouvel Jolie, 18
Born in Swakopmund, Namibia, in May 2006, Shiloh is Jolie and Pitt’s first biological child.
When she was born, local Namibian governor Samuel Nuuyoma called the birth “an honour for our country,” saying that the “delightful news” of a baby is “something very special in our African tradition.”
Despite her mother hoping that her children would not emulate her acting career (“I would really prefer they do something else,” she told Elle magazine), Shiloh's first film gig came when she was just two years old. She and her dad appeared in The Curious Case of Benjamin Button in 2008. Six years later, she was offered the part of a young Aurora in her mother's 2014 film Maleficent. However, she rejected the role, with her younger sister Vivienne taking it instead.
"I asked Shiloh about being Aurora, and she laughed in my face," Jolie told Elle. "She said she'd be a horned creature." Shiloh went on to voice Shuai Shuai in Kung Fu Panda 3 (2016).
Shiloh has a passion for another performing type — dance. She has practised at an elite dance studio in LA, but her father has said he doesn't know where Shiloh got her talent. In an interview with E!, he called himself "Mr. Two Left Feet".
Jolie has said that growing up, Shiloh thought she was "one of the brothers.” She has been progressive in her fashion choices, which Jolie has supported. “I think she is fascinating, the choices she is making,” Jolie told Reuters in 2010.
“I would never be the kind of parent to force somebody to be something they are not. I think that is just bad parenting,” she said. “Children should be allowed to express themselves in whatever way they wish without anybody judging them because it is an important part of their growth.”
“Society always has something to learn when it comes to the way we judge each other, label each other. We have far to go.”
Pax Thien Jolie-Pitt, 20
Pax Thien Jolie-Pitt was born on November 29, 2003 in Pham Quang Sang, Vietnam.
His biological mother battled addiction and abandoned him when he was only two days old after discovering he had liver problems. When Jolie adopted Pax in 2007, he became the fourth Jolie-Pitt child at the age of three. Jolie adopted him by herself due to Vietnamese laws that make it difficult for unmarried couples to adopt, but Pitt formally adopted him the following year.
His name means “peaceful sky”, with Pax being the Latin word for peace and Thien meaning sky in Vietnamese.
After bringing Pax back to the US, Jolie told People he was a “tough, remarkable little person”.
She said: “He spent 3 1/2 years of his life in one place, in one room, in this one little iron bed with 20 other kids, and having no choice for himself to do things, having no freedom.
“And suddenly, here he is in a very free situation with new brothers and sisters and a mom and dad. He's learning English and he's so loving and he's wild and free 'cause he suddenly has freedom so he's a little wild and crazy.”
In 2011, the Jolie-Pitt family returned to Vietnam to explore Pax's home country before his eighth birthday.
While Pax has enjoyed a life mostly out of the spotlight, he has dabbled in the performance arts. He voiced the character of Yoo on Kung Fu Panda 3 and was a set photographer on Jolie's film First They Killed My Father in August 2022.
Discussing working with Pax and Maddox on various film sets, Jolie told People: “We work well together.
“When a film crew is at its best, it feels like a big family, so it felt natural.”
Pax graduated from a prestigious LA private school in 2021 but did not attend the ceremony as he did not want to make a “circus” of the event, the Sun reported.
An insider told Us Weekly that Pax’s relationship with his father was fraught and they were not speaking.
Knox Léon Jolie-Pitt, 15
In 2008, Jolie and Pitt announced they were expecting another addition to the family when Jolie appeared at the Independent Spirit Awards displaying a visible baby bump. On July 12, Jolie gave birth to twins Knox Léon and Vivienne Marcheline Jolie-Pitt in Nice, France. Knox arrived a few minutes before his sister, weighing 5.3 lbs. Later, it was disclosed that the boy was named in honour of Pitt's grandfather, Hal Knox Hillhouse.
After returning from the hospital, the couple described their household as "busy," and credited their older children for helping them look after their younger siblings.
Jolie told People that Shiloh and Zahara were excited about selecting outfits for the twins and often helped "changing and holding them." Jolie said that as a toddler, Knox exhibited qualities reminiscent of his father.
He's also reportedly into martial arts and was pictured in attending a class in 2021.
Vivienne Marcheline Jolie-Pitt, 15
Knox’s twin, Vivienne, was born on July 12, 2008.
So far, Vivienne has not been camera shy, making her film debut alongside her mother in Maleficent as a young Princess Aurora
"We think it’s fun for our kids to have cameos and join us on set, but not to be actors," Jolie told Entertainment Weekly. "That’s not our goal, for Brad and I, at all.
"But the other three- and four-year-old [performers] wouldn’t come near me. It had to be a child that liked me and wasn’t afraid of my horns and my eyes and my claws. So it had to be Viv."
Vivienne will serve as her mother's volunteer assistant on Jolie's upcoming Broadway adaption of Francis Ford Coppola's 1983 film The Outsiders.
"Viv reminds me of my mother in that she isn’t focused on being the centre of attention but in being a support to other creatives," Jolie said. "She’s very thoughtful and serious about theatre and working hard to best understand how to contribute."
Outside of her performance arts career, Vivienne is at school and looks after her pet rabbits.
