14 DAY TRIAL // As we were also telling you the other day, Angelina Jolie made a surprise appearance at this year’s Comic-Con to promote her latest film, which also happens to be among the most hyped productions of the summer, “Salt.” Also then, USA Today got to ask her a few questions and to make her open up a bit more about her darker, less sane side, Us Magazine says.
Speaking about her much mediated youth days, when she used to wear a vial of her lover’s blood around her neck or kiss her brother on the lips, not to mention the many outrageous things she’d tell the media about herself, Angelina says that was just her trying to show off. She grew up in the spotlight and did not know how or whether she should hide her wild side – so she just flaunted it for everybody to see. That side of her is still there, she says, just that, now, people don’t see it anymore.
“There’s certainly a side of me that isn’t completely… sane. Or completely ‘even’ all the time. We all have our dark sides. I grew up in front of everybody, really. The big years of exploration. There was a certain madness I was going through. I learned a lot about myself. People tend to sum up times in your life and simplify. I would say there’s a way of being bold when you’re young that seems very brave… What’s perceived as tough is a very funny thing. I think to be a parent is one of the scariest, boldest things to do, as opposed to, um, getting a tattoo… Much more than jumping into a pool when you’re 20,” Jolie says.
Being a figure as public as she is also means she has to have balance in her everyday life, something to compensate for the madness. Luckily, Angelina now has Brad Pitt, of whom she says in the same interview he makes her a better person on all levels, from a mother to a woman and an actress. As for that last part, Jolie also reveals she rarely, if ever, watches her own movies because she doesn’t want to become too aware of her public self. Once a star does that and gets to see how other people perceive him or her, there is no turning back and the risk of becoming a shallow person is huge.
“When it’s a great partnership, you really are patient with each other. [Brad] has been a huge influence on me. In all ways, from my parenting to my art, to … everything. […] My evolution, and any extremes in my evolution, has been my personality, out of the nature of what’s inside me. I’m very unaware of my public self. I don’t read anything written about me. I don’t look at magazines. I only watch the films and premieres if I have to. I still haven’t seen some of my films. If you become aware of a public self, you’re in danger of becoming a very artificial person,” the actress explains.
Follow me on Twitter @ElenaGorgan