Jennifer Aniston Slams Claim About Why She and Brad Pitt Broke Up

Jennifer Aniston is weighing in on a longstanding rumor about her and Brad Pitt — calling it completely false. In an interview with Allure published on Nov. 9, the actress called out a perception that she was “selfish” in her relationship with Pitt, 58, which led to the marriage’s dissolution. “I just cared about my career. And God forbid a woman is successful and doesn’t have a child,” she said. “And the reason my husband left me, why we broke up and ended our marriage, was because I wouldn’t give him a kid. It was absolute lies. I don’t have anything to hide at this point.” The Friends alum said it was “really hard” to deal with the public speculation about her private life. “I would’ve given anything if someone had said to me, ‘Freeze your eggs. Do yourself a favor.’ You just don’t think it. So here I am today. The ship has sailed,” she said.

After her separation from Pitt, Jennifer told Vanity Fair in 2016 that she “always wanted children,” saying, “I did, I do, and I will!” In 1998, she made headlines for dating Pitt, and after the two married, Aniston expressed interest in having children. “It’s time. It’s time. You know, I think you can work with a baby, I think you can work pregnant, I think you can do all of it,” she told The Guardian in 2004. “So I’m just truly looking forward to slowing down.” During their marriage from 2000 to 2005, Aniston revealed she had tried everything to become a mother, including IVF and Chinese tea. She said, “I was throwing everything at it.”

In 2005, the pair announced their split after five years of marriage. During their breakup, Pitt started dating his Mr. and Mrs. Smith costar Angelina Jolie. Fans wondered if he was still with Aniston when he began to link up with the 47-year-old Eternals actress. In a 2021 interview with The Hollywood Reporter, Aniston talked about how people made unwarranted assumptions about her private life due to her fame. The actress admitted “people certainly project onto you,” but she said her “job” was to “show you what I’m capable of, and you decide if you want to subscribe.”

“I used to take it all very personally — the pregnancy rumors and the whole ‘Oh, she chose career over kids” assumption,’” she said. “It’s like, ‘You have no clue what’s going with me personally, medically, why I can’t… can I have kids?’ They don’t know anything,” she continued, condemning the “hurtful” and “just nasty” speculation. Pitt and Jolie, married for two years, share five children: Maddox, 21; Pax, 18; Zahara, 17; Shiloh, 16; and twins Knox and Vivienne, 14. The couple split in 2016. In the meantime, Aniston was married to Justin Theroux from 2015 to 2017. Despite her second divorce, The Morning Show actress has hinted that romance is not out of the question. “Never say never, but I don’t have any interest. I’d love a relationship. Who knows?” she told Allure. “There are moments I want to just crawl up in a ball and say, ‘I need support.’ It would be wonderful to come home and fall into somebody’s arms and say, ‘That was a tough day.’”