You may have noticed an attention to more vulnerability-driven characters in much of Brad Pitt's recent work, including his lead role in James Gray’s upcoming space epic Ad Astra. In a fresh interview with The New York Times, the acclaimed Once Upon a Time in Hollywood co-star expounds on that crucial vulnerability and discusses the powerful takeaways he got out of spending a year and a half in Alcoholics Anonymous.
"I had taken things as far as I could take it, so I removed my drinking privileges," Pitt, who's briefly touched on his relationship with drinking in previous post-divorce interviews, told writer Kyle Buchanan. Speaking specifically on the recovery group he met with during this period, Pitt championed their focus on a vulnerability he had often ignored in his younger years.
"You had all these men sitting around being open and honest in a way I have never heard," Pitt said. "It was this safe space where there was little judgment, and therefore little judgment of yourself."
That nonjudgmental environment also extended to a united effort at protecting Pitt from the sharks of the gossip world, with not a single soul in the group selling him out to publications of the tabloid variety.
"It was actually really freeing just to expose the ugly sides of yourself," Pitt added. "There's great value in that."
He's right. Therapy is awesome.
The new Pitt x Times chat also includes some specifics regarding his journey to Ad Astra (the title for which is Latin and means "to the stars"), more on vulnerability's many strengths, and one hell of an aside about the Pitt-produced Moonlight's infamous Oscars moment.
Pitt was in Los Angeles the night Moonlight won Best Picture, but had opted to skip the awards ceremony for a dinner of spaghetti at Gray's house. Pitt ultimately found out "secondhand" during the dinner that the film had won, to which Pitt responded (per Gray's recollection) "Oh wow, that's cool."
To be clear, this reaction is not a sign of indifference to the beloved film but—as Gray explained—just shows how Pitt simply isn't all that interested in awards matters. "I think he knows to stay centered," Gray said.
Read the full thing here, then catch Ad Astra at a theater near you Sept. 20.
