Why are we still obsessed with Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston? Our fascination is incomparable
THE meeting was fleeting, lasting only a few moments. Just two Hollywood stars saying hello in a corridor at an awards ceremony.
A celebratory hug. A fond look. A touch of the hand. But these weren’t just any old A-listers – they were Brad Pitt and Jennifer Aniston.
The footage that surfaced of the pair at the SAG awards last month sent the world into meltdown thinking that maybe they were getting back together.
Although it’s been 15 years since America’s former golden couple got divorced, that didn’t stop bookmakers taking bets on their reunion, memes of that look doing the rounds and #Bradandjen trending on Twitter.
We just can’t let it go when it comes to Brad and Jen. Our fascination is incomparable. No one is wishing Katy and Russell will give it another go, or Gwyneth and Chris. So why do we still root so hard for the Aniston-Pitts?
Partly, it’s the fact that we all felt Jen’s heartbreak when pictures of Brad and Angelina Jolie on a beach emerged in 2005, not long after their split.
Then there’s the “Poor Jen” schtick which has followed, um, poor Jen around ever since. The unshakeable narrative that she’s unlucky in love, despite the fact she’s had numerous other relationships since Brad, with hotties such as John Mayer and Gerard Butler, plus another marriage to Justin Theroux, which ended in 2018.
Looking at the SAG pictures was like being back in the good old days. Back when Brad and Jen were loved-up and pictured canoodling at LA concerts and revealing their engagement at a Sting gig. Or when they’d go to premieres with the same highlights in their glossy blonde hair, both dressed in matching beige outfits.
Seeing them look so cosy together again, it was possible to imagine that the last couple of decades never happened, or that in a parallel universe they had never split up at all. In that universe there’s no war, hunger or climate change and The Great British Bake Off is still on the BBC – such is the power of Brad and Jen.
She’s still the classic girl-next-door and he’s the ultimate movie hunk, so seeing these two paddle-board into the sunset together would be the best happily ever after. Perhaps there’s also an element of pining after our own lost loves. Everyone has a One Who Got Away, and by wishing Brad and Jen would get it on again, we’re living vicariously through them.
Because behind all of it, there’s an inkling that maybe this time it could work for them. They’re now older, wiser and at the top of their game.
They both won awards at the SAGs – Jen’s first in 20 years, for her turn on Apple TV’s The Morning Show; Brad for his role in Once Upon A Time In Hollywood. He even seemed to take a swipe at Angelina in his acceptance speech, when he said: “This role was a bit of a stretch: guy who gets high, takes his shirt off, doesn’t get along with his wife.” Cut to Jen in the audience laughing. Maybe all along they were just “on a break”, Ross and Rachel style.
And then we remember their wedding in 2000 when a gospel choir sang and Jen vowed to make Brad’s favourite banana milkshake every day. Imagine if they did it again? It could become a global holiday: Brad ’N’ Jen Day!
Of course, this thinking is ludicrous.
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They’ve now been apart three times longer than they were married, but it seems we just won’t give up hope. When photos of Brad attending Jen’s Christmas party and her 50th birthday party came out late last year, they were followed by reports that they were already engaged, secretly married and adopting a baby in Mexico.
But let’s face it, those SAG pictures served a particular purpose, turning up in January (AKA the most depressing month of the year) at a time when we’re all in need of some light-hearted whimsy. Perhaps they are just two exes who had a brief but cordial interaction at an awards show.
But where’s the fun in that?