Latest news with #Shepard
Time of India
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Time of India
‘I needed rebooting.' Brad Pitt does Angelina Jolie divorce flashback, recalls battling alcohol addiction in AA meetings
In 2019, Brad Pitt first opened up about spending time in Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) when he was interviewed for a profile in the New York Times. In his interaction, the actor shared that he entered the programme in 2016 after his marriage with Angelina Jolie hit splitsville and she filed for divorce. 'It was actually really freeing to just expose the ugly sides of yourself,' he told the outlet of entering the programme at the time. 'There's a great value in that.' Brad Pitt bares it all on Dax Shephard's podcast Cut to 2025, six years on. The Ocean's 13 actor hit nostalgia mode and reflected on alcohol addiction and his sobriety journey on Dax Shepard's podcast, Armchair Expert, which dropped on Monday, June 23. The Oscar-winner, in a candid chat with his industry colleague, spoke about his time in Alcoholics Anonymous and said he didn't hesitate to open up due to how "desperate" he was when he began the programme. The two actors also spoke about getting to know one another in an AA meeting. Pitt, on Shepherd's show, was effusive in his praise for AA, calling it an 'amazing thing.' 'I just thought it was just incredible men sharing their experiences, their foibles, their missteps, their wants, their aches, and a lot of humor with it. I thought it was a really special experience," the 61-year-old actor said. Sobriety was not easy for Pitt But Pitt's AA journey did not begin on a special note. Like anyone else, he, too, had his own apprehensions about joining the programme. His initial approach included him feeling a bit 'shy' coming into the AA group. However, once in, he also didn't hesitate to open up because of how low he was at that time. 'I was pretty much on my knees, and I was really open,' he told Shepard who himself has been very open about his struggles with substance abuse and sobriety. 'I was trying anything and everyone. Anything anyone threw at me. It was a difficult time. I needed rebooting. I needed to wake the f*** up in some areas. And it just meant a lot to me,' Pitt, the two-time Golden Globe winner, said while recounting his recovery. 'It's not the winner's club' Shepard, who has been hosting the Armchair Expert since 2018, asked Pitt whether he was nervous about connecting publicly given the vulnerability of recovery groups. The actor responded that he was "quite at ease," despite initially being shy. Pitt replied in a tone of reassurance, "quite at ease.' The 61-year-old said that after a few sessions, AA meetings held a different appeal for him, and became 'something I'd look forward to.' Pitt, whose next big outing, F1, hits the screens on Friday, added that he approached therapy with a similar openness. He said, 'When I jumped into therapy then, I was just like, 'And I did this and I did that and da da da da,' ' calling his approach 'desperate.' 'Yeah. You don't come into AA because everything's working out fantastic,' Shepard agreed. 'No. That's usually not the entry point,' Pitt quipped in response. 'It's not the winner's club,' Shepard added. 'Your hair has gotta be on fire before you go like, 'Yeah, I'll go hang with a bunch of dudes and talk about emotions.' ' Pitt's next film, F1: The Movie, where he plays a race car driver and stars along with Javier Bardem, hits theatres on June 27.
Hindustan Times
25-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Hindustan Times
Brad Pitt opens up about his first AA meeting after his divorce from Angelina Jolie: ‘I needed to wake the f*ck up'
Brad Pitt is finally speaking openly about a chapter of his life that, until now, has mostly lived in headlines and court filings. In a recent conversation on Armchair Expert with Dax Shepard, the actor peeled back the curtain on his first Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) meeting — a moment that came during the emotional wreckage of his divorce from Angelina Jolie. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie 'I needed rebooting,' Pitt, 61, confessed. 'I needed to wake the fuck up in some areas.' After years of keeping his struggles private, the Oscar winner's candidness surprised even Shepard, 50, who recalled the surreal experience of having Pitt in the room. 'A bazillion famous people' had attended that same meeting, Shepard said, but none had the overwhelming presence of Pitt. 'You were so fucking honest,' Shepard told him. 'I was like, he must have a stubbornness like I have, which is like, 'Yeah, all this is going on, but I refuse to let it not let me be a person.'' Pitt admitted he hadn't viewed it that way; instead, he described himself as broken and desperate. 'I was pretty much on my back, on my knees,' he said. 'I was really open to… I was trying anything that anyone threw at me. It was a particularly difficult time.' Though he was nervous at first, the actor said the room's raw honesty helped him push past his fear. 'Everyone was so open, it gave me permission in a way to go, 'OK, I'm going to step out on this edge and see what happens.' Then I just really grew to love it.' The experience, Pitt added, stood in stark contrast to his upbringing in Missouri's Ozarks, where emotional suppression was the norm and 'everything's great' was a default response to pain. Pitt's battle with alcohol was thrust into the spotlight following a now-infamous altercation on a private jet in 2016, which reportedly contributed to the collapse of his marriage. Legal filings during the divorce claimed that he had assaulted Jolie and two of their children during the flight. Both the FBI and the Los Angeles County Department of Children and Family Services investigated, ultimately deciding not to pursue charges.
Miami Herald
24-06-2025
- Entertainment
- Miami Herald
Brad Pitt Details First Experiences in AA Meeting After Angelina Jolie Divorce
Brad Pitt has rarely alluded to the personal struggles he faced following his highly publicized divorce from Angelina Jolie in the mid 2010s. But in a new interview with Dax Shepard on the popular Armchair Expert podcast, the 61-year-old actor has provided candid insight into his experiences after splitting from Jolie, including his first Alcoholic Anonymous meeting alongside the 50-year-old Shepard. "I just thought it was just incredible, men sharing their experiences, their foibles, their missteps, their wants, their aches, and a lot of humor with it," Pitt said of his initial AA meeting. "I thought it was a really special experience." Looking back at this first meeting, Shepard said that he was initially worried the fame surrounding Pitt might deter him from sharing honest insight into past struggles with substance abuse. Much to the comedian's surprise, however, Shepard remembered Pitt approaching the meeting with a surprising amount of honesty and candor. "You were so f***ing honest," Shepard commented to Pitt. "I was like, he must have a stubbornness like I have, which is like, 'Yeah, all this is going on, but I refuse to let it not let me be a person.'" Agreeing with Shepard's assessment, Pitt said that the primary reason for his blunt honesty at the time came from a genuine desire to get better, allowing him to improve his life by putting certain past mistakes behind him. "I was pretty much on my knees, and I was really open," Pitt said. "I was trying anything and everyone. Anything anyone threw at me. It was a difficult time. I needed rebooting. I needed to wake the f**k up in some areas. And it just meant a lot to me." "When I've stepped in s**t, I'm pretty good at taking responsibility for it and owning up to it," the Fight Club actor continued. "And now it's a quest to, you know, 'What do I do with this? How can I right this?' And make sure it doesn't happen again." Copyright 2025 The Arena Group, Inc. All Rights Reserved
Sydney Morning Herald
24-06-2025
- Health
- Sydney Morning Herald
In an era of wellbeing obsessions, I've become deeply sober un-curious
Is the purpose of life to survive the longest or enjoy it the most? Right now, society has become so obsessed with optimal health that I fear it's making us unwell or, at the very least, entirely joyless. And personally, I'd prefer to experience rich, brilliant years as opposed to regimented virtuous ones. A decade ago, the gold standard of a Sunday morning used to be a luxurious sleep in after too many drinks the night before, followed by a hearty breakfast with friends. Then maybe a movie, reading a book, pottering in the garden, or a boozy long lunch. And, sure, maybe some exercise. These days, we're told to rise before the sun, journal, take an ice bath, fast until after lunch, and avoid having a glass of wine with dinner. Some people are even abstaining from sex – all with the goal of improving their health and living longer. Honestly, you couldn't pay me to live 80-plus years of that. Many of these new 'healthy hacks' are self-flagellation in disguise; a weird and mysterious test of discipline in the hope of getting an extra couple of years out of life. But it's worth questioning if perhaps something less admirable than healthy choices could be lurking below the surface, something US psychologist Jonathan Haidt raised in an interview with actor Dax Shepard on Shepard's podcast, Armchair Expert. When Shepard said that the so-called 'anxious generation' is struggling with poor mental health but 'thriving in other departments', Haidt took issue. 'On a lot of the self-destructive metrics, their behaviour is better – that's all true,' he said. 'Does that mean they're thriving? Why are they not drinking? Why are they not driving cars? Why are they not dating? Why are they not getting pregnant? Why do you think it is? Because they're so wise? No. Because they're not with other people. They're not doing anything. If you're just on your bed all day long, scrolling through social media, then you're not going to be doing any of those things.' A 2023 report by Ending Loneliness Together found that 41.1 per cent of Australians aged 18 to 24 suffer from persistent loneliness. And according to the ABC's 2019 Australia Talks survey, 40 per cent of people aged 18 to 24 are still virgins. They're also drinking less, with 16 per cent of Australians in the same age bracket having never tried alcohol, up from 7 per cent in 2001. As Haidt points out, they're not just abstaining from these things because they're sensible, they're also petrified of humiliation. Having grown up with their entire lives being documented, they don't want to embarrass themselves.
The Age
24-06-2025
- Health
- The Age
In an era of wellbeing obsessions, I've become deeply sober un-curious
Is the purpose of life to survive the longest or enjoy it the most? Right now, society has become so obsessed with optimal health that I fear it's making us unwell or, at the very least, entirely joyless. And personally, I'd prefer to experience rich, brilliant years as opposed to regimented virtuous ones. A decade ago, the gold standard of a Sunday morning used to be a luxurious sleep in after too many drinks the night before, followed by a hearty breakfast with friends. Then maybe a movie, reading a book, pottering in the garden, or a boozy long lunch. And, sure, maybe some exercise. These days, we're told to rise before the sun, journal, take an ice bath, fast until after lunch, and avoid having a glass of wine with dinner. Some people are even abstaining from sex – all with the goal of improving their health and living longer. Honestly, you couldn't pay me to live 80-plus years of that. Many of these new 'healthy hacks' are self-flagellation in disguise; a weird and mysterious test of discipline in the hope of getting an extra couple of years out of life. But it's worth questioning if perhaps something less admirable than healthy choices could be lurking below the surface, something US psychologist Jonathan Haidt raised in an interview with actor Dax Shepard on Shepard's podcast, Armchair Expert. When Shepard said that the so-called 'anxious generation' is struggling with poor mental health but 'thriving in other departments', Haidt took issue. 'On a lot of the self-destructive metrics, their behaviour is better – that's all true,' he said. 'Does that mean they're thriving? Why are they not drinking? Why are they not driving cars? Why are they not dating? Why are they not getting pregnant? Why do you think it is? Because they're so wise? No. Because they're not with other people. They're not doing anything. If you're just on your bed all day long, scrolling through social media, then you're not going to be doing any of those things.' A 2023 report by Ending Loneliness Together found that 41.1 per cent of Australians aged 18 to 24 suffer from persistent loneliness. And according to the ABC's 2019 Australia Talks survey, 40 per cent of people aged 18 to 24 are still virgins. They're also drinking less, with 16 per cent of Australians in the same age bracket having never tried alcohol, up from 7 per cent in 2001. As Haidt points out, they're not just abstaining from these things because they're sensible, they're also petrified of humiliation. Having grown up with their entire lives being documented, they don't want to embarrass themselves.
