Brad Pitt

Brad Pitt’s film career has been virtually eclipsed by his personal life in recent years.

The breakup with Jennifer Aniston.  The alleged infidelity and subsequent long-term coupling with Angelina Jolie.  The charity work for survivors of Hurricane Katrina and for children in Africa.  You forget what a fine actor he is.

Born in Oklahoma in 1963 and raised in Missouri by fundamentalist Baptist parents.

“I always had a lot of questions about the world, even in kindergarten,” he told Parade in 2007.  “A big question to me was fairness.  If I'd grown up in some other religion, would I get the same shot at Heaven as a Christian has?  My mom would come into my room and talk to me.  I was very fortunate to have that dialogue with her, but in high school I started to realize that I felt differently from others.”

Pitt’s rejection of convention seems to be a recurring theme. He left the University of Missouri in 1986 two credits shy of a degree in journalism and moved to Hollywood to pursue an acting career.  Pitt supported himself with various odd jobs which included delivering refrigerators and dressing up as a chicken for a fast food chain.

A string of guest spots in the 1980s on TV shows like 'Another World' and 'Dallas,' led to Pitt's big break in 1991’s ‘Thelma and Louise.’ His turn as the sexy drifter who seduces Geena Davis brought him instant stardom.  Pitt followed up his breakthrough performance by playing a fly-fishing rebel in Robert Redford's 'A River Runs Through It,' the wild son of a Western family in 'Legends of the Fall,' and Louis, the iconic, self-hating vampire-in-spite-of-himself in the adaptation of Anne Rice’s ‘Interview with the Vampire,’ also starring Tom Cruise and Kirsten Dunst.

Pitt could have continued to make big studio films, but that unconventional streak led him elsewhere.  He ventured onto the dark side with the risky ‘Se7ven,’ starring alongside Morgan Freeman as a cop in pursuit of a serial killer.  Then it was onto the mental ward in’12 Monkeys,’ which won him the Best Support Actor Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination.   His exploration into the deeper recesses of our psyche with subsequent projects like ‘Fight Club,’ ‘Meet Joe Black,’ and ‘Snatch.’

It was also during this period that Pitt began his series of headline-making hookups.  He became romantically involved with Gwyneth Paltrow on the set of ‘Se7en,’ and the two announced their engagement in November 1996.  Ironically, it lasted only seven months.  Shortly after, he met ‘Friends’ star Jennifer Aniston.  They married in July 2000.

Marriage must have put him in a conventional mood, for the next year, he was back in big-budget studio blockbusters, co-starring with friends George Clooney, Matt Damon, and Julia Roberts in 'Ocean's Eleven’ before going into hibernation -- nesting with his Aniston, making a series of TV guest appearances, and some indie films.

The sequel ‘Oceans Twelve’ would mark the beginning of what must be the greatest media frenzy in recent history.  While filming ‘Mr. & Mrs. Smith,’ Pitt started a relationship with co-star Angelina Jolie that set off a publicity firestorm.  Aniston was cast as the wronged, long-suffering wife; Jolie as the voracious Jezebel; and Pitt as the mesmerized dupe.  Pitt and Aniston divorced in 2005.

But perhaps it was simply Pitt’s disdain of convention that led to the dissolution of his marriage.  His relationship with Jolie is non-traditional to say the least, but it seems to work for them.  They spend their time globe-trotting for humanitarian causes, and Pitt has adopted Jolie’s two children Maddox and Zahara.  In 2006, Jolie gave birth to their first child Shiloh in Nambia.  In 2007, they adopted a three-year-old boy Pax from Vietnam, and in 2008, Jolie gave birth to their twins in a hospital in the South of France.

The relationship marked a new trajectory in Pitt’s career, that of established artist.  He won the Best Supporting Actor Golden Globe and an Oscar nomination for his role in 2006’s ‘Babel’ starring opposite Cate Blanchett.  He also produced that year’s Best Picture ‘The Departed.’  He regrouped with co-stars Clooney and Damon in ‘Ocean’s Thirteen’ and starred with Casey Affleck in the Oscar-nominated ‘The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford.’

Pitt steps out into the unknown again, taking a jab at his own fame with the upcoming project ‘Chad Schmidt.’  He plays an actor who can’t get any work because he looks exactly like Brad Pitt.