Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s divorce is finally over after an eight-year battle. The end of their marriage also holds significance for Jennifer Aniston. The 55-year-old actress can finally breathe a sigh of relief that the love-triangle narrative played up by the tabloids for two decades is done.
Fans won’t ever forget the whispers from the set of Mr. & Mrs. Smith in 2004 and the reported chemistry Pitt and Jolie shared. Aniston was portrayed as America’s sweetheart on Friends, so the abrupt end of her marriage to Pitt on Jan. 7, 2005, fueled headlines for years. He had reportedly confessed his feelings for Jolie on a holiday vacation and Brangelina was officially born. They made their official debut on the cover of Us Weekly with paparazzi snapshots of them on the beach in Kenya with three-year-old Maddox. The story was so hot that the magazine allegedly paid $500,000 for the images.
It’s what Vox dubbed the “biggest tabloid love triangle of the 2000s” as people took sides and anointed themselves “Team Aniston” or “Team Jolie.” Even after Jolie and Pitt split in 2016 and Aniston ended her marriage to Justin Theroux in 2018, the internet tried to reunite them. Their brief, but friendly, encounter at the January 2020 SAG Awards was a hot story. They both won awards that night — Pitt for Once Upon a Time… in Hollywood and Aniston for The Morning Show. There were hopes that the quarterback and the head cheerleader of Hollywood would get back together.
So, how does Aniston feel about being relieved from that exhausting love triangle now? Well, it sounds like she will keep her thoughts to herself. “Jen isn’t looking to talk about Brad and Angelina’s divorce publicly, nor is she looking to reach out to Brad and offer any congratulations,” a source told the Daily Mail. “The next time they see each other, they’ll be cordial with each other, they have been in the recent past and that won’t change.”
The real reason comes down to one single issue — Jolie was the catalyst for their divorce in the first place. Aniston and Pitt won’t “dive into his feelings about the divorce” because “Angelina is not a talking point between them and that will remain the same forever.” Aniston may have moved past her relationship with Pitt years ago, but Jolie is probably a sore point with her — and that’s understandable.
Still, Pitt’s divorce from Jolie offers closure on a story that captured the Hollywood headlines for far too long. The women were pitted against each other when much of the blame rested on Pitt’s shoulders, he had a responsibility to honor his marital vows to Aniston. He can’t rewrite the story, but he will hopefully do better in his future relationships.
Before you go, click here to see all the celebrity couples who met on set.
