For one emotional reason, it would be ‘very hard’ for Angelina Jolie to give up primary custody of the five minor children she shares with Brad Pitt. This is what it’d take for the ‘Maleficent’ star to budge.
Do you hear that silence in Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s custody battle, which was once heavily sensationalized between 2016-2018? You’re not mistaken — Angie is perfectly content with their current arrangement, and that’s having her minor children Pax, 15, Zahara, 14, Shiloh, 13, Knox, 11, and Vivienne, 11, under her wing most (and not 50 percent) of the time. “They have a complicated arrangement at present, but she has primary custody with Brad getting tons of visitation as instructed by a judge the last time they went to court,” an Angelina source EXCLUSIVELY tells HollywoodLife.
“No, she has no plans to offer him joint custody,” our source further reveals, updating us after the exes, who split in 2016, reportedly reached a temporary custody agreement in Nov. 2018. That truce reportedly gave Angelina’s estranged husband “less than 50 percent custody of the couple’s six children,” per The Blast, and Angelina would like to keep it that way — “unless she’s ordered to do so by the judge,” our source points out.
As for why Angelina’s retaining such a tight grip on primary custody, it all boils down to her love for the kids. “She has no issues with Brad spending time with the kids and she is being sure to follow all visitation guidelines set down by the courts, but she doesn’t want to give up primary custody,” the source clarifies to HollywoodLife. “Of course, if the law requires her to give Brad joint custody she will comply, that’s a given.” Should that actually happen, however, “it will be very hard on her because the kids are her world.”
For now, Angelina isn’t entertaining hypothetical outcomes of her custody agreement. “She’s not the type to focus on that possibility [of giving Brad joint custody], she’s not a glass half empty type of person,” our source continues. “There’s no Plan B at this time, she’s really just rolling with the punches.”
Even though Brad has less custody than Angelina, we’re hearing their current co-parenting system is free of drama. “When they’re all in town [in Los Angeles] the kids have their visits with their dad at his home in Los Feliz several times a week,” our source explains. Further elaborating on Angelina and Brad’s unique system, our insider adds, “They travel back and forth with their bodyguards and drivers and Angelina doesn’t go along for the hand off. It is very well coordinated and drama free. And Brad has been very reasonable, as far as allowing for Angelina [to take] the kids away when she’s on location [for movies], as long as he’s getting his scheduled time when they are in town.”
Despite these scheduled visits, the Jolie-Pitt children have only been photographed with Angelina throughout the summer and fall of 2019. They’re often seen on shopping trips with Angelina, and the mother of six even brought her children — except for Maddox, 18, who’s in Korea for college — along for her international Maleficent: Mistress of Evil press tour throughout September and October.