Brangelina can find no middle ground. Despite reports that Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie have issued a sort of truce in the midst of their divorce proceedings, the ceasefire is far from over when it comes to the custody battle over their six children.
“There is no truce,” a source told Us Weekly on Wednesday. “Angie is extremely hard to deal with, period. She wants what she wants, and no one is going to tell her otherwise.”
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The source added that the fight has only intensified since Jolie changed her legal counsel to Samantha Bley DeJean last month. “Angie is once again doing things that are interfering with Brad’s custodial time with the children. There have been several occasions in recent weeks in which the kids have been late, with Brad unable to reach anyone for answers,” the source said.
The fight for custody has become so heated, in fact, that the 43-year-old actress and director has even aimed veiled digs at Pitt.
“I think it is not said enough how much we need the men in our lives to be strong and capable and the best they can be,” she told Hello! UK when asked about feminism.
But sources close to Jolie maintain that she simply wants “reconciliation” and to put her family back together. “Angelina remains focused on healing her family,” a family friend told Us Weekly in August. “She continues to support the reconciliation of the children with Brad.”
Meanwhile, Pitt is “hopeful” that he’ll be awarded joint custody of his six kids: Maddox, 17, Pax, 14, Zahara, 13, Shiloh, 12, and Knox and Vivienne, 10.
“He’s hopeful he’ll have joint custody of the children. All Brad wants is to be a present dad and coparent with Angelina,” a source told Us Weekly in September.
Pitt and Jolie were married for two years and dated for 10 before they divorced in 2016, citing irreconcilable differences. They first met in 2003 on the set of their 2005 thriller, Mr. and Mrs. Smith.
Jolie transitioned to new counsel in August. The change came after Jolie “put [Bley DeJean] in the lead a month ago, and over the past month, the case has been fully transitioned to [her],” a source told PEOPLE at the time. The switch came weeks after Jolie’s publicist denied a report from TMZ saying her then-current lawyer was quitting because the proceedings were “too venomous.”
The children spent much of the summer in London with Jolie while she filmed Maleficent 2, but they normally live in Los Angeles, where Pitt also lives. Pitt spent his time split between London and Los Angeles, were he films Quentin Tarantino’s upcoming Charles Manson movie, Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.
