The Evolution Of Brad Pitt

At 55, the consummate Hollywood star seems to have the Hollywood parts figured out, using his wattage to get unlikely movies (like his new space odyssey, Ad Astra) into theatres. But inside, there’s a whole lot Brad Pitt’s still working out.

- Zach Baron

He’s Brad Pitt, though. With him comes an atmosphere, his own weather, a heightened kind of reality that involves everyone in the vicinity looking directly at him until he’s gone. Despite that – or, maybe at this point, because of it – he’s learnt to be comfortable, at ease, just about anywhere. Anyway, picture a room we’re both strangers to. That’s where Brad Pitt and I talk.

Just yesterday the Quentin Tarantino film Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, which Pitt stars in opposite Leonardo DiCaprio, opened in New York and Los Angeles. Pitt was also watching the final cuts of a film called Ad Astra, directed by James Gray, that was due in theatres in September. All of a sudden, people were remembering the existence of Brad Pitt – the great movie star, maybe our greatest, in not one but two movies, reminding everyone just how good he is at this when he bothers to do it. Because he doesn’t actually act much anymore. He hasn’t made a big deal about this – just gradually receded into his own life and pursuits, which in the past few years have been turbulent and included a spectacularly public divorce. In Hollywood he’s increasingly become more of a producer and power broker, through his company Plan B Entertainment, than an on-screen presence.