Random
The
Harper's Bazaar cover is for "the ultimate winter fragrance,
Guerlain Mon Guerlain Intense Eau de Parfum." So these quotes may have
been prepared at the same time as those for the other Mon Guerlain Intense
articles which appeared earlier.
Madame Figaro had similar quotes. At least this one is in English. 😀 What is true for both: She
never mentions "
divorce." She makes
no reference to the
filing or the
case. She does
not
give so much as a hint of the incident on the plane, the children's trauma
or the efforts to restore Brad's relationship with the children.
It says "she writes candidly." It does
not say she responded to questions. There was
no interview nor correspondence between them,
no actual Q&A. She is characteristically direct even in live interviews.
HB and probably
Madame Figaro and others altered the supplied questions to make them more attention-grabbing and thus don't align with her answers. If the questions printed below were the actual questions her prepared quotes were designed to respond to, her answers would have clearly addressed them instead of being oddly off target.
Aside from the rare glimpse of the intimately placed
Whiskey Bravo for William Bradley tattooed on her right inner thigh, what is notable in what she did say:
"
I would love to live abroad and will do so as soon as my
children are 18. Right now I’m having to base where their father chooses
to live."
In Madame Figaro:
What does your life look like in Los Angeles?
I'm not really attached to this town. I'd rather travel more
often, but it's not compatible today with Brad's work. I'm cooperating.
Brad has to spend time in L.A. because that's where his therapist, AA meetings, Dr.
Katz, and the mental health
professionals who are guiding the effort to
restore his relationship with the children are based. She is where he needs to be because he
needs her
with him and she puts his needs
ahead of her own wants because that is
love. When asked during
MMoE's stop in Tokyo: Is there anything
more powerful than
love? She answered, “
Family.” He is both.
Brad
said:
"I’ve
been thinking about that because I’ve been thinking about death, just
in terms of, ‘Where do you want to spend that last leg of your life? We settle in places or get sucked into a place sometimes
because of a job or for family,
speaking of which, my kids have probably eight more years of school to
keep us relatively in one spot. But then comes a time where you think
about where you want to spend that last period. For me, it would be
somewhere in the mountains.”
They often live abroad -- they are living abroad now. They are saying when the twins are in college -- when they are 18 -- they can hop around more freely without fear of disrupting their studies or having to have their tutors in tow.
"
Sometimes you get hurt, you see those you love in pain, and you
can’t be as free and open as your spirit desires." -- She was hurt. A "family member"
said: “
Her family is broken and she is in agony. Her
children are recovering from the events that brought about the filing” and that left them traumatized. But in "
you see those you love in pain" she is referring to Brad. He had to deal with feelings of "no worth," tortured thoughts of "a horrible end," before ultimately, "forgiveness of self." It is why she makes sure she is always there for him. They haven't been free to talk openly about it much as they would want to. But maybe soon. "It’s not new or old,
but I do feel the blood returning to my body."
When Josh Horowitz of MTV News asked her about the new ink, she offered merely, “Um, it’s for Brad.”
Harpers Bazaar
As we wrap up 2019, and look ahead to 2020,
Harper’s BAZAAR chose Angelina Jolie to grace our final issue of the
year because quite simply, there’s no one else like her. Jolie has spent
nearly 20 years with the UN Refugee Agency fighting for the rights and
freedoms of displaced people, and over 10 years funding schools for
girls from Afghanistan to Kenya to Cambodia. She is a Visiting Professor
in Practice at the London School of Economics, educating students on
peace and security and the fight for women’s rights internationally. She
champions women’s health—in particular, treatment for cancer—with
honesty and openness about her own health experiences in years past.
Here,
she writes candidly about “visible and invisible scars,” her fight for
freedom around the world, and why she doesn’t mind sharing her new home
in Cambodia with a family of chipmunks.
Petticoat rule. Giambattista Valli Haute Couture ball gown.
HARPER'S BAZAAR: We recognize in these photos the free-spirited, bold side of you we know from old. Is that a fair characterization?
ANGELINA JOLIE: My
body has been through a lot over the past decade, particularly the past
four years, and I have both the visible and invisible scars to show for
it. The invisible ones are harder to wrestle with. Life takes many
turns. Sometimes you get hurt,
you see those you love in pain, and
you
can’t be as free and open as your spirit desires. It’s not new or old,
but I do feel the blood returning to my body.
Do you feel like you’re finding yourself again?
AJ: The
part of us that is free, wild, open, curious can get shut down by life.
By pain or by harm. My children know my true self, and they have helped
me to find it again and to embrace it. They have been through a lot. I
learn from their strength.
As parents,
we encourage
our kids to
embrace
all that they are, and all that they know in their hearts to be right,
and
they look back at us and want the same for us.
As
a mother of six, in a world of social media on a public stage, under
relentless scrutiny, how do you teach your kids to be bold?
AJ: Knowing
our true self is a very important question for all of us. Especially a
child. I think kids need to be able to say, “Here’s who I am, and what I
believe.”
We can’t prevent them from experiencing pain, heartache,
physical pain, and loss. But
we can teach them to live better through
it.
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As a public figure, how do you deal with
the frustration of constantly being misunderstood? What do you think is
the biggest misconception about you?
AJ: I
have a tattoo, “A prayer for the wild at heart kept in cages.” I got it
when I was 20. I was with my mom one evening, and I was feeling lost. I
was restless—always. I still am. We were driving to dinner, and she
talked about spending time with Tennessee Williams and how much she
loved his words. She told me he wrote that, about the wild at heart. We
drove to a tattoo parlor, and I got it inked on my left arm. What she
did for me that night was to remind me that the wild within me is
alright and a part of me.
I see so much
beauty
in
other people.
Not when they are
pretending to be something
other than
their true selves. Not when they are harming others. Not when they
lie.
But the wild ones. The emotional, open, searching ones, longing to be
free. The
honest ones. Because anything else is a cage impossible to
live in.
This is our end-of-year edition. Looking ahead to 2020, do you have a message for our readers?
AJ: My
dream for everyone in 2020 is to remember who they are and to be who
they are regardless of what might be disrupting their ability to be
free. If you feel you are not living your life fully, try to identify
what it is or who it is that is blocking you from breathing. Identify
and fight past whatever is oppressing you. That takes many forms, and it
is going to be a different fight for everyone. I say this with a deep
understanding that for so many women, freedom is simply not an option.
Their own system, community, family, government works against them and
is part of what is shutting them down. I’m reading the book
No Visible Bruises,
which points out that between 2000 and 2006 more American women died
from domestic homicide than American soldiers died on the battlefield.
It is shocking that across the world the most dangerous place for women
today is the home. There are still more than a dozen countries where
violence against a wife or family member is legal. And more than 10
countries where perpetrators of rape can still escape prosecution if
they marry the victim. And there are more than 70 million forcibly
displaced people worldwide, including nearly 26 million refugees. None
of this is just “the way the world is.” It is something monstrously out
of balance. And our response can’t be to shrug or to think only about
our own countries, because we are all connected. This is a time to
fight. If there is a fight in this life, it must be for freedoms and
rights. And if we have our freedom, we must fight for others who don’t.
Sounds rebellious
AJ: If nobody ever rebelled, nothing would ever change.
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As a woman, what does it mean to be truly free? And to live boldly?
AJ: A
life fully lived is very hard to do. And for many women it is
impossible because of what they are up against. I am conscious every day
that I have the freedom to speak openly and to make my own choices. And
the ability to encourage my children to explore the world, including
the world of ideas and expression, without there being limits to what
they are allowed to study or know or imagine themselves doing in the
future. I think we all know boldness when we see it. Nothing makes me
smile more than when I see
someone being fully themselves, with their
own individual style and character, whatever that is.
How did you like to dress when you were younger?
AJ: At
school I wasn’t that popular person; I was a punk. I loved leather,
PVC, and fishnets. Those were my three favorite fabrics in my early 20s.
I remember the first time I wore PVC pants. I was waiting for an
audition, sitting in the sun in L.A. By the time it was my turn, my
pants had fused together. I didn’t get the part. But I loved those
pants. I wore something similar when I married Jonny [Lee Miller].
Dreaming in red. Hermés swimsuit.
Sølve Sundsbø
Women often feel forced to live up to the
standards of “the perfect mother” and “the perfect wife.” Do you think
this idea of perfection is dangerous and damaging to women?
AJ: Labeling
people and putting them into boxes isn’t freedom. Difference and
diversity are what I value most—in my family and in others. I don’t want
to live in a world where everyone is the same, and I imagine that’s
true for everyone reading this. I want to meet people I’ve never met
before and learn things I don’t know. The challenge today is to embrace
our differences. And not to be fooled by efforts to divide us or make us
fear others. We’re seeing a retreat of values worldwide. Many
governments are less willing to stand up for the kinds of values that
previous generations fought and died to secure. When governments stand
back, people have to lead the way, as they are in different parts of the
world.
Have you ever felt restricted in your own life?
AJ: I
don’t think of myself that way. In my youth, I focused on what I didn’t
have. But as I traveled in my early 20s, my awakening was realizing the
freedoms I had in comparison to many people around the world. I’d
experienced a childhood free of war. And since then I’ve had the freedom
to build my family, to create art, and to play the characters I have.
It’s one of the reasons I’ve invested in schools for girls in different
countries. To see anyone—but especially a young girl with so much
potential—denied their freedom is infuriating to me. I don’t think we
will be living in a new era for women’s rights until there has been
progress. Until people who’ve raped and abused women and girls in Syria
and Myanmar and the DRC, for example, are held accountable. That’s why
the focus for the Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict Initiative is
to push for an international accountability mechanism, a body that would
allow us to overcome the barriers to justice so prosecutions happen.
Pucker up. Leg Avenue body stocking; Vince Camuto briefs; Gianvito Rossi pumps;
Sølve Sundsbø
Has there been progress in Hollywood, in light of #MeToo?
AJ: As
anybody knows, the usual starting point in any situation like this is
an independent inquiry by experts who can look into the facts and
identify what legal changes and protections are needed so there is some
measure of independent expert scrutiny and accountability. That hasn’t
happened.
You built a home in the Cambodian jungle
and became a Cambodian citizen. Can you tell us about that decision?
What were some of the biggest challenges? And biggest rewards?
AJ: When
you have a loud mind, as I do, you go to places that quiet you, and I
find that in the desert, or in the jungle in Cambodia. When I first went
to Cambodia, I thought people would be hardened by having experienced
so much war and suffering. But in fact it was the opposite. I found them
to be full of grace and fight and life. It’s a home and a headquarters
for my foundation. There were physical challenges, though. We had to
clear nearly 50 land mines before we could live there.
You have traveled the world as both an actor and a United Nations special envoy. What is your favorite place?
AJ: My
favorite place is somewhere I’ve never been. I like to be dropped into
the middle of something new. I enjoy being out of my element. I want the
children to grow up in the world—not just learning about it but living
it and having friends around the world.
Next year we break ground on a
home in Africa.
Cause célèbre. Bulgari Serpenti ring.
Sølve Sundsbø
Are you going back to Cambodia soon?
AJ: We
got a call the other day informing us that chipmunks have moved into
the house. They asked if we should remove them, and Vivienne was very
clear that we needed to cover the wires and let them stay. However, the
local snakes may have their own opinion on that. The last time I stayed
there, I heard screaming down the hall because a friend had found a
giant lizard under their pillow. Clearly, the animals are there more
than I am and they feel it is their home.
You
talk about wanting to encourage your children to explore the world,
including the world of ideas and expression. Can you give a specific
example of a time when you and your family personally butted up against
these kinds of unspoken societal limits?
AJ: I would love to
live abroad and will do so as soon as
my children are 18.
Right now I’m having to base where their father chooses to live.
You say you want freedom for others. What do you mean?
AJ: I
do, and not just for those who are oppressed or living with limited
rights. I often ask people, “What is it you’ve always wanted to do?”
Ninety percent of the time it is an attainable goal and something they
admit they could have already done. I think the challenge is to ask
yourself what you’ve always wanted to do, and do it. Don’t just be
comfortable with what is generally accepted, but find the new. Find your
oxygen, your originality, your own voice. Live more fully. Rebel.
Resist. Question. Be curious. Explore. Go outside what is comfortable to
you. Say the thing you’ve been afraid to say. Put down this magazine,
and go and do one thing today you’ve never done before.
ANGELINA'S MISSION
Angelina Jolie is Special Envoy
of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, after 18 years with the
agency, and Visiting Professor in Practice at the London School of
Economics Centre for Women, Peace and Security. She is also cofounder of
the Preventing Sexual Violence in Conflict Initiative, a global
campaign against war-zone rape.
This article originally appears in the Dec-Jan 2019-2020 issue of Harper's BAZAAR, available on newsstands November 19.
Hair:
Malcolm Edwards; Makeup: Val Garland; Manicure: Chisato Yamamoto;
Production: LaLaLand; Set design: Max Bellhouse; Retouching: Digital
Light Ltd.
