Brad Pitt, 55, says he now values his 'missteps': 'They led to some wisdom'
Actor Brad Pitt is usually fiercely private about anything other than his work, although he has made a few exceptions, mostly for his love of designing furniture and his activism.
However, the Once Upon a Time in Hollywood star was candid about his emotions and aging in an October conversation with Anthony Hopkins, his co-star in 1994’s Legends of the Fall and Meet Joe Black, from 1998, published Monday by Interview magazine.
After Pitt, 55, complimented the 81-year-old Hopkins on being “as vibrant as ever,” Hopkins assured Pitt that the younger actor is “as easy going as ever.”
“Pretty much, it’s my gliding speed,” Pitt said. “But I lose it at times. I get sucked into something, and I can lose it. I take my hands off the wheel.”
Hopkins said that only proves that Pitt is “human.”
Pitt also mused about fate and whether he can take credit or blame for what’s happened over the course of his life.
“I’m realizing, as a real act of forgiveness for myself for all the choices that I’ve made that I’m not proud of, that I value those missteps, because they led to some wisdom, which led to something else,” Pitt said. “You can’t have one without the other. I see it as something I’m just now getting my arms around at this time in my life. But I certainly don’t feel like I can take credit for any of it.”
Hopkins said he’s read about Pitt’s “struggle with booze.” (Elsewhere in the conversation, Hopkins confirmed that he had also had a problem with alcohol.)
Pitt’s marriage to Angelina Jolie reportedly unofficially ended in September 2016, after the spouses allegedly argued about his drinking during a private flight that included their eldest son, Maddox. Pitt was under investigation for child abuse, although he was eventually cleared.
“I had taken things as far as I could take it, so I removed my drinking privileges,” Pitt told the New York Times in September. The star spent 18 months in Alcoholics Anonymous.
These days, Pitt revealed to Hopkins that he’s more apt to break into tears than he was when they worked together.
“I am quite famously a not-crier. Is that a term?” Pitt said. “I hadn’t cried in, like, 20 years, and now I find myself, at this latter stage, much more moved — moved by my kids, moved by friends, moved by the news. Just moved. I think it’s a good sign. I don’t know where it’s going, but I think it’s a good sign.”
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