Brad Pitt And Angelina Jolie's Lawyers Have Some Blunt Thoughts About The Other Party’s Tactics

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie in Mr and Mrs. Smith
(Image credit: (Fox))

Brangelina called it quits back in 2016 and have since become legally single, but their divorce proceedings are not yet over. The Mr. and Mrs. Smith co-stars share six children together and are facing conflicts regarding their upcoming child custody and support case. Last week, Angelina Jolie and her legal team requested the judge assigned to their case be disqualified and Brad Pitt and his lawyers are reportedly not happy with her tactics.

On August 10, Jolie claimed in filed court documents that their judge John W. Ouderkirk “failed to disclose” his prior working relationship with one Brad Pitt’s attorneys Anne C. Kiley and therefore should be removed from the proceedings. Ouderkirk has worked with two of Pitt’s lawyers Kiley and Lance Spiegel on numerous occasions, including Modern Family creator Steven Levitan’s divorce, which dragged on for at least two years.

Brad Pitt allegedly thinks his ex-wife has “gone way too far this time,” per an unnamed US Weekly source. His lawyers made this statement in response to the case’s latest development. Here's the official word,

The individuals hurt most by Jolie’s transparently tactical gambit are the parties’ own children, who continue to be deprived of a final resolution to these custody issues.

The source also disclosed that Brad Pitt and their team find no other option but to “dig in and fight back – hard” for the complications in the case involving 19-year-old Maddox, Pax, 16, Zahara, 15, Shiloh 14 and their youngest Knox and Vivienne, who are 12-year-old twins.

According to a previous statement by Jolie, the Maleficent actress is not interested in “trying to delay” the proceedings. Her attorney claimed that all she is “asking for is a fair trial based on facts.” Jolie’s lawyer had this to say following fires from Brad Pitt’s team:

Any delay in these proceedings is due to [Pitt’s team’s] zealous attempt to create an unrecognized special exception for their client’s benefit.

Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie’s custody case is expected to go to trial this October following the pair being granted legal single status in 2019. The couple met on the set of Doug Liman’s Mr. and Mrs. Smith back in 2005, an action comedy about a married couple that go after one another after they learn they are competing assassins. They were together for twelve years and married in 2014 before splitting in 2016.

Now this doesn’t even touch the levels of 2020’s other high-profile couple case between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard. Most recently, Elon Musk challenged Depp to a “cage fight” for claiming he had an affair with Amber while they were married among many bizarre allegations coming out of the ongoing lawsuit expected to come to a verdict in the near future.

Angelina Jolie's next big role is in Marvel’s Eternals coming February 2021 and Brad Pitt is starring in David Leitch’s action flick Bullet Train. Stay tuned here on CinemaBlend for more movie news.

Sarah El-Mahmoud
Staff Writer

Sarah El-Mahmoud has been with CinemaBlend since 2018 after graduating from Cal State Fullerton with a degree in Journalism. In college, she was the Managing Editor of the award-winning college paper, The Daily Titan, where she specialized in writing/editing long-form features, profiles and arts & entertainment coverage, including her first run-in with movie reporting, with a phone interview with Guillermo del Toro for Best Picture winner, The Shape of Water. Now she's into covering YA television and movies, and plenty of horror. Word webslinger. All her writing should be read in Sarah Connor’s Terminator 2 voice over.