Brad Pitt’s family divide deepens as another daughter files to drop his last name

Another one of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s children has filed to officially remove Pitt from their last name.

Zahara Marley Jolie-Pitt is the latest to drop her father’s last name from her own after her eldest brother Maddox and younger sibling Shiloh made the same move, distancing themselves from the famous actor.

The name change documents were filed April 28 in the Superior Court of California, coming just days after Maddox’s filing, according to documents first obtained by In Touch magazine.

At her graduation ceremony weeks later, Zahara’s name was read as Zahara Marley Jolie when she accepted her diploma onstage at Spelman College in Atlanta in May.

A source close to Pitt told The Independent, “It’s sad to see one parent alienate their children from the other.”

Angelina, 51, and Pitt, 62, who split in 2016 after over a decade together, share six children: Maddox, 24; Pax, 22; Zahara, 21; Shiloh, 20; and twins Knox and Vivienne, 17.

Shiloh, a dancer and the former couple’s first biological child, was the first of the siblings to be granted a name change on their 18th birthday in 2024 and now goes by Shiloh Jolie.

Maddox’s name change made headlines earlier this year, when his decision to just be called Maddox Jolie was revealed in the credits for Angelina’s recent film Couture, on which he worked as an assistant director.

Zahara’s decision to drop Pitt goes back as early as November 2023, when she introduced herself as simply Zahara Marley Jolie in an introduction video for the Mu Pi chapter of the Alpha Kappa Alpha sorority at her university.

In the video, she was seen dancing with her sorority sisters before introducing herself: “My name is Zahara Marley Jolie. And [I] landed all the way from the Golden State in the city full of angels: Los Angeles, California.”

In May 2024, Vivienne was also credited as only Vivienne Jolie, instead of Vivienne Jolie-Pitt, in a Playbill for The Outsiders — a Broadway play she helped her mom produce.

The family divide came after a 2016 airplane incident in which Pitt allegedly got into a heated argument with his wife and children. Following an FBI investigation into child abuse allegations after the incident, Pitt was cleared of all charges. However, a detailed account of what transpired on the private plane was made public record during the pair’s divorce proceedings.

According to the documents, Angelina told investigators that Pitt’s behavior on a private flight from France to Los Angeles frightened their children, who were between the ages of eight and 15 at the time. The Maleficent actor alleged that Pitt lunged at one of their children and that she had to hold him back “in a choke hold.” She filed for divorce the day after the incident.

In 2023, a years-old scathing Father’s Day post reportedly from Pax’s private Instagram account emerged in which he reportedly said to his adoptive dad: “Happy Father’s Day to this world class a***hole. You time and time and again prove yourself to be a terrible and despicable person.”

Pax, who was 16 at the time of the post, also reportedly wrote, “You have made the lives of those closest to me a constant hell. You may tell yourself and the world whatever you want, but the truth will come to light someday.”

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