You Can’t Wreck a Marriage if there isn’t a Marriage There to be Wrecked: The Will They or Won’t They Relationship of Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie

It is truly amazing to see how often life imitates art.  In 2005, the world was treated to the action/relationship movie, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” that showed the relationship between a bored couple who have kept their careers as assassins secret from each other.  However, once they are assigned to wipe out the other, the couple find, to their surprise, that their passion and love for each other are reignited.  Although the story is preposterous, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” would be one of the most successful movies of the decade.  With its witty mixture of violence and humor, much of the success of “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” can be attributed to the out of the world chemistry between its two lead actors, Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.

Audiences around the world couldn’t get enough of the intense chemistry between two people who are widely considered to be two of the most attractive people in the world.  However, the success of the movie grew even more when reports surfaced that this preposterously beautiful on-screen couple were becoming a couple off-screen.  The media swell became huge and news about “Brangelina” became some of the most sought after in the world.

Further adding spice to the media cocktail that was the Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie relationship was the fact that Brad Pitt was already in a high profile celebrity marriage with Friends star, Jennifer Aniston.  Although Jennifer Aniston is considered to be television royalty and was beginning a promising movie career, her celebrity status couldn’t match Angelina Jolie’s.  With her undisputed status as one of the sexiest women of all time and her penchant for speaking her mind, Angelina Jolie is one of the most recognized celebrities around the world.  While Jolie and Pitt would deny that their relationship began while Pitt was still married to Aniston, many people in the public are skeptical.

Whether or not Brad Pitt cheated on Jennifer Aniston with Angelina Jolie may be a subject to date but what isn’t disputed now is that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are one of the most famous celebrity couples today.  The two are well regarded for their commitments to humanitarian missions and for their penchant for adopting children from impoverished nations.  Quickly becoming one of the more stable celebrity relationships in Hollywood today, it can be argued that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie are the most famous celebrity couple today.

Of course the question now is whether these two bombshells are willing to take their relationship to the next level and take a trip down the aisle.  While cynics may say that they won’t get married due to the fact that their relationship likely caused the breakup of one celebrity marriage, you can never count these two unpredictable and likable Hollywood stars out.  After all, they’ve already shocked the world once with their relationship.  Maybe they’ll do it again by embracing such a traditional ceremony as marriage.

Over the last decade, Brad Pitt has become ubiquitous as Hollywood royalty.  Chosen by People Magazine twice as the Sexiest Man Alive, Brad Pitt’s celebrity is an issue that nobody questions.  After all, on top of his easy on the eyes appearance is an intensity that Pitt brings to his best acting roles.  Quickly becoming one of the most likable actors of his generation due to his bold choices to act against type, it is easy to take Brad Pitt’s success for granted.  Take one look at Brad Pitt’s biography and you will see that the real surprise is how Brad Pitt even got to where he is.

Born on December 18, 1963 in Shawnee, Oklahoma to high school counselor, Jane Etta Hillhouse, and William Alvin Pitt, who owns a trucking company, William Bradley Pitt showed little inclination that he wanted to be an actor.  Raised in Springfield, Missouri, Brad Pitt shown an early interest in sports, debating, and student government.  He would go the University of Missouri – Columbia campus where he was pursuing a journalism degree at the school’s Missouri School of Journalism.  With three credits left to go, Pitt would surprise the school’s faculty and his friends at The Sigma Chi fraternity by leaving school and going to Hollywood with just $325 in his pocket.  Although Pitt had acted in some fraternity shows, he didn’t display any particular enthusiasm towards acting.

However, although Brad Pitt didn’t show any career ambitions towards acting while he was in college, he would show his drive once he arrived in Hollywood.  Pitt would study under acting coach Roy London for six years and would make various appearances on popular TV shows like “Head of the Class,” “Growing Pains,” “21 Jump Street,” and the soap opera, “Another World.”

In an industry rampant with overnight successes, Brad Pitt properly paid his dues by appearing in a series of B-movies.  He appeared in the movie, “Cutting Class” about a cheerleader-stalking maniac and also in “Dark Side of the Sun,” where he played a person struggling to find the remedy for a skin condition that he is afflicted in.  He would also play a drug addict in the TV movie, “Too Young to Die,” where he entered his first high profile romance with future Academy Award nominated actress, Juliette Lewis.

Brad Pitt would soon get his big break in his brief cameo in the feminist classic, “Thelma & Louise.”  Playing a small time criminal drifter that seduces Geena Davis’ character, this role prominently displayed Brad Pitt’s looks and would help bring attention to his potential as Hollywood’s next big sex symbol.  Pitt would attempt to fight against the perceptions of being another Hollywood pretty boy by starring as a scruffy serial killer with his girlfriend, Juliette Lewis, in the cult classic, “Kalifornia.”  His co-starring role as the moody vampire, Louis de Pointe du Lac, in the hit 1994 movie, “Interview with a Vampire” would catapult Brad Pitt up to Hollywood’s A List.

His later starring roles in such enduring movies as “Se7en,” “12 Monkeys,” “Fight Club,” and “Troy” would offset his starring role in commercial failures like, “The Devil’s Own,” “Meet Joe Black,” “The Mexican,” and “Seven Years in Tibet.”  With his affable personality, bold acting choices, and his easygoing nature, Brad Pitt’s ascension to Hollywood royalty has been relatively scandal free.  His co-starring role in “Oceans Eleven” with fellow Hollywood superstars George Clooney, Matt Damon, and Julia Roberts cemented his international celebrity status.

However, another reason why Brad Pitt has managed to become an international icon has much to do with the great romances of his life.  After his breakup to Juliette Lewis, Brad Pitt would get engaged with his “Se7en” co-star, Gwyneth Paltrow.  This relationship would not lead into a celebrity marriage but Pitt’s next high profile relationship would.  In 1998, Brad Pitt would meet Friends star Jennifer Aniston and the two would date for a couple of years before getting married on July 29, 2000.  A couple that valued its privacy, their wedding was kept a major secret, and the Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston relationship was viewed as one of the biggest celebrity marriages of its time.  However, by 2005, the two would eventually separate and divorce.  Almost right away, photos showing Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie together were released and Brangelina was born as a major media phenomenon.

Unlike her future partner, Angelina Jolie seemed destined to become a famous actress.  The daughter of respected actor and star of Midnight Cowboy, Jon Voight, and actress, Marchline Bertrand, Angelina Jolie Voight was born on June 4, 1975 in Los Angeles, California.  Her parents would separate a year later and Jolie and her brother would move to Palisades, New York where their mother would raise them.  An eccentric child who collected snakes and lizards, Angelina Jolie would attend the Lee Strasberg Theatre Institute at the age of 11, when her mother would move the family back to Los Angeles.

Despite her status as one of the world’s most beautiful women, Angelina Jolie had to overcome a number of troubles when she was in high school.  Due to the fact that she was extremely thin, wore glasses and braces, and came from a more modest income than her fellow classmates at Beverly Hills High School, Jolie was often teased.  Although Jolie would begin a modeling career at an early age, she never found real success in that field.  This increased alienation led to Jolie doing strange things such as cutting herself as a way to feel alive by feeling pain.  Her reigning status as one of Hollywood’s baddest girls due to her frank declaration of being bisexual and for her large number of tattoos can be traced back to this tough time in Jolie’s life.

Although Jolie briefly worked as a model during her teenage years and appeared in a number of music videos, she would make her professional debut as an actress in the 1993 low budget horror movie, “Cyborg 2.”  Starring as a near-human robot that is designed to exploit her sexuality as a way to enter a rival manufacturer’s headquarters in a kamikaze mission, it would be safe to say that Jolie’s career had an inauspicious start.  She would gain some attention in the cult 1995 movie, “Hackers.”  While Angelina Jolie would win an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress in 1999 for her role in “Girl, Interrupted,” and has made many box office hits like, “Tomb Raider” and “The Bone Collector,” the truth of the matter is that Jolie has not had a particularly distinguished movie career.  Although she is rightly praised for the intensity that she brings to certain roles, Angelina Jolie is arguably more famous for being famous.

Much like Brad Pitt, Angelina Jolie catapulted into the public attention due to her incredibly good looks.  While her recent selection as the greatest sex symbol of all time by the show, The 100 Greatest Sex Symbols, might be overstating her case just a bit, it was Jolie’s mixture of Hollywood beauty and her wild girl behavior that made her one of the most popular tabloid celebrities just a few years ago.  A woman that would wear a vial of her second husband, Billy Bob Thornton’s blood around her neck and who many people suspected had an incestuous relationship with her brother James Haven is always going to be one of the most fascinating celebrities out there.

However, just a few years ago, Angelina Jolie’s public reputation took a drastic overhaul.  In one sweep swoop, Angelina Jolie would go from Hollywood’s resident wild child to United Nations Goodwill Ambassador.  Following the adoption of her son, Maddox, Angelina Jolie would use her consider celebrity clout to bring attention to humanitarian causes throughout the world.  She played a prominent role in promoting World Refugee Day 2006 and has visited many refugee camps throughout the world since her relationship with the United Nations began in 2001.  Her humanitarian work has been widely praised and she was awarded the Global Humanitarian Award on October 12, 2005 by the UNA-USA and the Citizen of the World Award on October 24, 2003 by the United Nations Correspondents Association.

This commitment to international humanitarian causes and to the development of her own family has steered Angelina Jolie’s attention away from Hollywood.  Although her 2005 movie with Brad Pitt, “Mr. and Mrs. Smith” would be the biggest hit of her career, Jolie has been very selective in choosing film roles that would take up too much of her time.  Her use of celebrity to endorse humanitarian causes can be seen in her decision to sell the first photo of her visibly pregnant condition to People magazine in exchange for a donation to a Haitian based charity is indicative of where Angelina Jolie’s heart is these days.

Perhaps it is this selfless commitment to others that attracted Brad Pitt to Angelina Jolie.  Either that or it was Jolie’s near perfect body.  Whatever the reason, the budding celebrity relationship between Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie became one of the biggest media stories of 2005.  Rather than protesting against the media for intruding their privacy, Pitt and Jolie seemed to have much fun playing coy in the face of rampant media speculation.  The two even appeared in a photo shoot for W Magazine that saturated marriage roles in the 1960s.

However, the intense media scrutiny continues to follow Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie.  Photos showing Brad Pitt with Angelina Jolie and her son, Maddox, in exotic locations started to appear in newspapers with more frequency.  The relationship was viewed as being more serious once news leaked out that Brad Pitt was present when Angelina Jolie adopted her second child, Zahara.  On January 19, 2006, Pitt would legally adopt Jolie’s two children and the children’s surnames would become Jolie-Pitt.

It was around this time that people became aware that the Jolie-Pitt family would be increasing by one, as Angelina Jolie was pregnant with Brad Pitt’s child.  The resulting media storm resulted in the Brangelina decision to have their child born in Namibia where they would be able to avoid the media attention.  This slick celebrity couple may not have marriage plans in their future but the two are tied together forever due to their parental duties to Maddox Chivan Jolie-Pitt, Zahara Marley Jolie-Pitt, Shiloh Nouvel Jolie-Pitt.  Recent reports have surfaced that these two beautiful parents are looking to increase the Jolie-Pitt brood by adopting a child from Vietnam.  Who knows, by the time you finish reading this article, you may also have been chosen to become the latest member of Team Jolie-Pitt!