Brad Pitt is talking candidly about his personal life like never before. The “World War Z” actor gave an interview to GQ about his past struggle with “low-grade depression” and how he had spent most of his life feeling “very alone.”
The father-of-six has been sober for the past six years, a lifestyle change he made following his ex-wife Angelina Jolie’s decision to file for divorce in late 2016. Shortly after the marriage collapsed, Brad sought professional help and spent a year and a half in Alcoholics Anonymous before his next goal became to quit smoking cigarettes, which he successfully achieved during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Now, the 58-year-old is reflecting on his past and how he spent the earlier years of his life, telling GQ that while he has found himself embracing friends and family more than ever before, it took him reaching his 50s to finally break free from no longer wanting to feel alone. “I always felt very alone in my life,” he said. “Alone growing up as a kid, alone even out here, and it’s really not till recently that I have had a greater embrace of my friends and family.”
“I think joy’s been a newer discovery, later in life. I was always moving with the currents, drifting in a way, and onto the next. I think I spent years with a low-grade depression, and it’s not until coming to terms with that, trying to embrace all sides of self — the beauty and the ugly — that I’ve been able to catch those moments of joy,”
Further in the interview, Brad said that he also believed he was on the “last leg” of his career, and was currently “designing” what he would want his final chapter to look like. Having landed his big break 31 years ago when he landed a role in Ridley Scott’s 1991 flick Thelma and Louise, he had since went on to star in countless blockbuster movies such as “Fight Club,” “Se7en,” “Fury” and “Ocean’s Eleven,” to name a few.
But now it seems Brad is ready to step away from the world of acting as he’s carefully planning out how to bow out of the business gracefully. “I consider myself on my last leg, this last semester or trimester,” he said. “What is this section gonna be? And how do I wanna design that?’”
Meanwhile, Brad is currently caught up in a legal battle with Angelina, who he accused of seeking to “inflict harm” by selling her share of their vineyard to Russian oligarch Yuri Shefler without Brad’s knowledge, which has caused havoc on their business.